IRLF 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 


FRONTISPIECE 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


POEMS 


By 

HERMAN    SCHEFFAUER 

Author  of  "Of  Both  Worlds,"  etc. 


New  York  and  Washington 

THE  NEALE  PUBLISHING   COMPANY 

1908 


Copyright,   1908,  by 
THE  NEALE  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 


ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

are  due  the  Fortnightly,  Spectator,  Macmillan's 
and  Clarion  of  London,  and  Lippincott's,  New 
York  Times  Review,  the  Cosmopolitan,  Success 
and  various  Californian  periodicals  for  permission 
to  republish  many  of  these  poems. 


182273 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Proem  and  Dedication       .       .  .  '     .        .  9 

Man  and  the  Mountains     .        .  -.  ••      .        .  15 

The  Chant  of  Man  and  Woman  ...  19 

The  Fire  Funeral       .       .       .  .       .       .  22 

The  Song  of  a  Happy  Spirit     .  .       .        .  24 

The  Symbol  in  the  Cave     .       ...  ...     .  27 

Atlantis          .        .       .     .  .       .  ...  32 

San  Francisco  Desolate       .       .  .       .       .  34 

O  Evanescence!          '.       .       .  ...  37 

The  Ruined  Temple    .       .       .  „       .       .  38 

To  the  Earth-Daemon      -y.      :.  .       .       .  39 

The  Rhapsodist    .       .       .       .  ,       .       .  41 

Keats  at  Winter  Sundown       .  ...  47 

The  Tower  Garden     ...  .        .        „  48 

London  in  Snow         .       .       .  .        .        .  49 

The  Sea  and  the  City         .        .  .       ;       .  51 

The  Throne  of  the  Storm         .  .        .       .  52 

The  Leper  of  London       .       .  .       .       .  53 

Manhattan     .        .       .        .       ^  .               .  55 

"An  Amiable  Child"                                          '.  57 

Beauty  Trove       .        .        .     :  .  .        .        .  59 

Assault  of   Silver        .       .        .-  .        .        .  62 

Washington  Irving       .        .        .  .        .        .63 

The  Looms  of  Life       .        ...        .        .  64 

Hymn  to  the  Passing  Earth       .  .        .        ;  74 

The  Master  of  Magnificence     .  .        .        .  77 


CONTENTS  (Continued) 

PAGE 

Song  of  the  Sundown 79 

Vale,  California           81 

The  Shadow  O'er  the  City       .                       .  82 

London          ,.       -.        .        ...        .        .  83 

To  Mimic  Poets         .        .        .        .       .        .  84 

To  William  Butler  Yeats                          .        .  85 

Acme !     .       . ,     .       .       .       .       ...  86 

The  Sculptured  Indian       .        .        .        .        .  87 

The  Peean  of  the  Poppies         ...        .  88 

The  Sierra  Snow-Plant      .        .        .        .        .  90 

The  Californian  Poppy       .       .        .        .        .  91 

Mary  of  Milrone         .        .        ...        .  93 

Heights    and    Depths         .      •.        .       ...  100 

Architekton            .        .        .  '             .       .       .  100 

Friedrich  Nietzsche     ...       .       .        .  101 

Prologue  in  Heaven     .        .       .       •      .•       •  IO2 

A   Dedication        .        .        .        .     '  .       .        .  104 

The  Quest  at  End 104 

Bianca  ...        .        .        .        .        .106 

The  Moon  Damozel           .        .        .        .       .  108 

Russia  Agonized .no 

Souls  of  Men  Asunder 115 

How  Could  Men  Hate  Thee,  Lucifer?         .  117 

The  Iron  Virgin 123 

The  Land  of  Alabaster 126 

The  Forging  of  the  Rings       ....  127 

The  Storm-Night 135 


"tKSvry) 

u/5*» 


PROEM 

AN  D 

DEDICATION 

TO 

E.  D. 

When  the  harps  of  a  land  lie  forlorn, 

And  the  lips  of  its  minstrels  are  still. 
When  the  scroll  of  the  poet  lies  torn, 
And  his  song  wakes  an  echo  of  scorn, 
And  the  laugh  of  the  fool  seeks  to  kill, — 

When  the  Age's  grim  armor  enthralls 

Our  souls  in  a  bondage  of  things, 
When  Mammon  squats  throned  in  his  halls, 
Fenced  by  ramparts  of  ore,  and  his  walls 
Ring  with  joy  of  the  p  (Ban  he  sings, — 

When  the  Fathers'  dreams  trodden  in  mire, 

And  the  Goddess  torn  into  the  dust, 
Stamp  their  shame  like  a  brand  of  fierce  fire 
On  our  brows, — when  the  chords  of  the  lyre 
Are  corroded  and  covered  with  rust, — 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Then  the  gods  from  their  altars  withdraw, — 

Then  the  tongues  of  the  prophets  of  doom 
Are  laden  with  dole,  and  the  awe 
That  once  hallowed  the  Tablets  of  Law 
Is  harried  by  thieves  to  the  tomb. 


Then  the  Engine  of  Gutenberg  pours 

Its  baneful  reflex  of  the  Time, 
Then  the  people  are  smitten  with  sores, 
And  the  Dome  of  the  Capitol  roars 

With  the  shouts  of  the  Caesars  of  Crime. 


Then  women  alone  feed  the  name 

That  grows  dim  on  the  altar  of  Art, 
Then  do  men,  unashamed  in  their  shame, 
Make  a  traffic  of  nation  and  name 

With  the  jackals  and  wolves  of  the  mart. 


So  no  rapture  of  Music  is  heard 

Save  the  trivial  strain  of  the  lute 
Of  the  rhymesters.     The  deeps  are  unstirred 
By  the  storm  of  some  wonderful  word, 

Since  the  harp  and  the  harpers  are  mute; — 

10 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


And  blind  to  the  trend  of  the  tides, 

To  the  light  still  upborne  by  the  years, 
To  the  meaning  immortal  that  bides 
Through  the  ominous  noon  of  new  Ides 
And  the  mystic  designs  of  the  spheres. 


They  chant  treason  to  Life  and  their  Time, 

Chained  to  gods  that  sleep  realmless  and  cold, 
And  weave  Dian  and  Phoebus  in  rhyme 
Out  of  fables  and  myths  of  the  Prime 
And  the  legends  vvhose  glory  is  told. 


Yet  no  storm  from  a  resonant  lyre 

Whelms  the  querulous  pipe  and  the  reed, 
Yet  no  anthem  uprolls  like  a  fire 
From  the  organ-tubes'  thunder;  no  choir 
Hath  a  voice  for  our  Age  and  its  need. 


And  lo!  it  hath  come  that  the  Stars 

O'er  the  vast,  indivisible  States 
Gleam  sick  to  the  world,  and  the  Bars 
Of  the  Standard  are  spotted,  and  scars 
Vex  the  flesh  of  the  Eagle.    The  Fates 

ii 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Sit  stern  in  the  murk  as  they  weave 

An  inscrutable  glory  or  doom 
For  the  robe  of  the  land,  and  they  heave 
Their  shuttles  that  murmur  and  grieve 

As  they  shoot  the  black  woof  through  the  loom. 


And  where  calls  a  voice  to  the  bards 

To  smite  with  the  falchion  of  Song, 
The  head  of  the  hydra  that  guards, 
Under  golden  and  ponderous  wards, 
The  god  of  the  minions  of  Wrong? 


From  the  harps  oceanic  that  round 
The  sonorous  and  ultimate  West, 
Pour  a  rapture  of  music  profound 
From  their  surges  of  peace,  to  the  ground 
The  Atlantic  strains  unto  its  breast, — 


May  the  thunders  be  mustered  to  burst 

Like  the  Horn  of  the  Ram  with  its  blast, 
The  gilt-pillared  temple  accurst 
Where  the  Snake,  in  corruption  immerst, 
Rears  high  o'er  his  worshippers  massed! 


12 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Over  Time's  steep  horizons,  O  clouds! 

Bare  your  phantoms  of  nations  long  dead; 
Fling  the  dust  of  strong  Rome  and  the  shrouds 
Of  Tyre  on  the  winds,  and  the  crowds 

Of  tall  ships  bent  on  Carthage  the  red. 

Lest  swift  on  these  domes  by  the  verge 
Of  two  seas  where  our  citadels  stand. 
The  red  bolt  should  fall  and  the  scourge, 
And  in  room  of  a  warning,  a  dirge 

Be  upborne  from  the  lips  of  the  land! 


Still  my  service  and  birthright  I  choose 

With  the  sons  of  the  Westland, — for  long 
We  stand  devotees  bound  to  the  Muse, 
Lest  our  realm  of  the  Sunset  should  lose 
Its  Hesperian  lustre  in  Song. 

And  to  thee  who  divinest  my  dreams, 

And  share st  my  thought,  I  indite 
The  remote  and  most  fugitive  gleams 
Of  these  songs,  for  thou  knowest  the  streams 
Of  my  soul,  and  their  source,  and  the  light. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


MAN  AXD  THE  MOUNTAINS 

The  winds  of  worlds  upon  the  brow  of  Man, 

Valleys  and  gorges  dark, — 
Twilight,  and  purple  banners  in  the  van 

Of  Night's  encroaching  arc. 

Whisper  of  weary  seraphs,  then  a  hush, — 

Sighs  and  vast  solitude; 
Then  the  slant  lances  of  the  sun  where  crush 

The  mountain-masses  rude. 

Serene  they  sat  erect  and  thronged  with  awe, 

Prodigious  with  the  sun. 
The  salient  majesties  of  peaks,  I  saw 

Held  one  mute  marvel — one! 

Their  brows  were  red  with  questions  of  the  Night ; 

Under  the  white  moon's  horn 
Their  iron  queries  stood  till  they  grew  bright 

With  answers  of  the  morn. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Again  Day's  skies  embraced  them  and  they  tore 
Its  light  and  pierced  its  dome, 

And  with  enormous  shoulders  they  upbore 
The  gods'  celestial  home. 

And  when  the  tribulation  of  the  rain 

In  mist  the  ranges  furled, 
Their  mighty  presences  pulsed  like  a  pain 

Whose  roots  seize  on  the  world. 

And  oft  the  voice  of  the  wind,  wild  orator! 

Clamored  and  rang  on  high, 
And  then  the  keen,  significant  stars  no  more 

Launched  malice  from  the  sky. 

Never  mad  storm,  nor  frost,  nor  summer  fire, 

Nor  rash  bolts  blazing  blue, 
Moved  them — the  everlasting  ones!  to  ire 

More  than  the  mild,  sweet  dew. 

They  breathed,  and  lo!  the  avalanches  sped 

To  emerald  vales  profound, 
Or,  harried  by  the  years,  some  boulder  fled 

Down  tracks  of  thunderous  sound. 


16 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Man's  race  was  but  a  murmur  through  the  nights, 

A  stain  Day  bore  to  view; 
No  sacrilege  of  tongues  upon  those  heights 

Broke  the  long  peace  they  knew. 

Their  caverned  orbs  saw  cities  on  the  plain — 

A  thousand  domes  and  towers 
Basked  sunbright — and  when  sank  their  eyes  again 

Wild  grass  and  windward  flowers. 

When  eons  waned  and  stars  strove  with  their  fate, 

Stern  Demiurgos  came, 
And  throned  upon  their  tallest  crests  he  sate 

And  spake  one  potent  name. 

Peak  leaned  to  solemn  peak.     The  master  stirred 

Their  granite  lips  to  speech; 
Each,  in  that  sinister  vast  awe  unheard, 

Darkly  communed  with  each. 

What  plots  profound,  what  fathomless  designs, 
Throbbed  through  the  palsied  air? 

What  subtle  secrecies  oppressed  the  pines 
Or  the  cold  moon-disc  bare? 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Through  their  deep,  runic  syllables  there  ran 

Tides  of  tremendous  doom, 
And  when  their  council  closed,  the  realms  of  Man 

Lay  dust  on  Time's  gray  loom. 

Eternity!  thy  mace's  conquering  blow 
Shall  break  and  fell  these  Kings, 

Yet,  till  her  face  lie  sunless,  Earth  shall  know 
These  mighty,  mystic  Things — 

Whisper  of  weary  seraphs,  then  a  hush, — 

Sighs  and  vast  solitude; 
Then  the  slant  lances  of  the  sun  where  crush 

The  mountain-masses  rude. 

The  wind  of  worlds  upon  the  brow  of  Man, 

Valleys  and  gorges  dark, 
Twilight,  and  purple  banners  in  the  van 

Of  Night's  encroaching  arc. 


18 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  CHANT  OF  MAN  AND  WOMAN 

Earth's  iron  mingles  with  my  blood, 

But  thine  with  milk  is  blent ; 
My  tears  are  of  the  salt-sea  flood, 

But  thine  sweet  springs  unpent. 
Thy  pulse  a  fertile  river  glides, 
But  mine  is  urged  by  ocean-tides. 
All  human,  human,  human, 

The  fire  of  heart  we  fan. 
Thou  are  the  Queen  called  Woman; 

I  am  the  King  called  Man. 

Like  mountain-winds  o'er  towers, 

So  calls  my  voice  and  rings; 
A  fragrant  breeze  'midst  flowers 

Is  thine  that  sighs  and  sings. 
A  garden-sheltered  plant  thy  form, 
And  mine  a  pine  within  the  storm. 

All  human,  human,  human, 
Through  us  a  tremor  ran. 

Thou  art  the  Queen  called  Woman; 
I  am  the  King  called  Man. 

19 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  eagle  sweeps  along  my  glance, 

Spanning  all  Earth  and  sky; 
Thy  tender  doves  of  vision  chance 

No  flight  so  deep,  so  high. 
My  thoughts  are  flames  on  mountain  heights, 
And  thine  are  lakes  of  mystic  lights. 

All  human,  human,  human, 
The  visions  that  we  scan. 

Thou  art  the  Queen  called  Woman; 
I  am  the  King  called  Man. 

Like  eager  lilies  drink  thine  ears 

Love's  note  and  the  infant's  cry; 
Mine  drain  the  thunder  of  the  spheres 

And  rapt  as  sea-shells  lie 
On  shores  of  Life's  resounding  sea 
And  hear  one  voice — Humanity! 

All  human,  human,  human, 
Curst  by  no  primal  ban. 

Thou  art  the  Queen  called  Woman; 
I  am  the  King  called  Man. 

Thy  cloven  bosom's  hill  and  vale, 

Where  Love  hath  set  his  tents, 
Hold  store  of  raptures  ringed  by  pale 
Of  spirit  and  of  sense. 

20 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


My  breast  is  fort  and  battle-field, 
But  not  to  thee — to  thee  a  shield. 
All  human,  human,  human, 

We  walk  in  Nature's  van. 
Thou  art  the  Queen  called  Woman; 
I  am  the  King  called  Man. 

Thy  brow  bears  halos  from  the  moon, 

Mine  fire  from  out  the  sun, 
Yet  through  Life's  morning  and  her  noon 

And  night  they  gleam  as  one. 
Linked  stars  are  we  in  Nature's  train, — 
Forever  one — forever  twain. 
All  human,  human,  human, 
Fruit  of  the  cosmic  plan, 
Thou  art  the  Queen  called  Woman; 
I  am  the  King  called  Man. 


21 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  FIRE  FUNERAL 

(The  Cremation  of  Shelley's  Body  near  Leg 
horn  in  the  year  1822.) 

On  the  dolorous  shore  where  remorseful  surges 

cast  him, 

Lies  the  poet,  cold  and  white. 
Low  groan  the  billows  as  their  foam  goes  blow 
ing  past  him, 
And  his  eyes  no  more  are  bright. 

Blue  eyes  bright  no  more  like  the  azure  lustre 

o'er  him, — 

Still  their  blue  repays  its  blue; 
Down  his  brow's  wtan  splendor  all  his  weeping 

curls  deplore  him 
Like  frail  tendrils  drooped  with  dew. 

There  he  lies,  Earth's  precious  sacrifice  to  griev 
ing  air  and  ocean, 
Kissed  by  wave  and  wind  and  sun, 
While  the  invisible  stars  of  day  trail  in  their 

ghostly  motion, 
Mourning  for  a  darkened  one. 

22 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


But  stars  shall  not  behold  him  more,  nor  Night 

nor  Day  forever, 
For  the  pyre  looms  on  the  shore, 
And  fond  arms  of  brother-poets  lift  him  now  with 

love  that  never 
Such  a  sweet,  sad  burthen  bore. 

Flames  feast  upon  those  seraph  lips  eternal  music 

moulded ; 

Fiery  halos  orb  his  head, 
While  fire  enfolds  that  body  which  a  soul  of  fire 

enfolded, — 
West  Wind,  moan!  thy  child  is  dead. 

Skyward  rolls  like  censer-smoke  a  dark,  majestic 

column 

Past  the  clouds  that  lift  the  morn, 
And  his  sacred  heart  in  balsam  by  his  comrades 

mute  and  solemn, 
To  a  northern  isle  is  borne. 

Now  the  broken  twilight  smoulders  and  the  crim 
son  coals  are  dying, — 
Winds  and  sands  the  ashes  hearse, 
And  his  dust  soars  free  where  worlds  and  suns, 

on  cosmic  currents  flying, 
Sow  it  through  the  Universe. 

23 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  SONG  OF  A  HAPPY  SPIRIT 

I  fold  my  shining  wings 

Close  o'er  my  throbbing  sides; 
I  lure  the  quivering  lark  that  sings 

Through  Ether's  thrilling  tides. 
O'er  mottled  clouds  I  climb 

And  lash  the  molten  air, — 
Sole  Lord  am  I  of  Task  and  Time 

Over  human  care. 

What  is  human  care? 
Is  it  the  voice  of  bells  that  chime 
Beyond  the  hills?  or  cities'  grime 

Dark  and  deadly  there? 

From  dawn  till  dusk  I  float 

Where  spear  the  solar  rays ; 
On  the  squat,  swelling  moon  I  gloat 

And  whirr  across  her  ways; 
I  thrid  the  tops  of  trees 

And  press  the  mountains  bare, 
But  still  the  pulse  within  the  breeze 

Throbs  with  human  care. 

What  is  human  care? 


24 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  snoring  winds  bear  o'er  the  seas 
Its  burthen  in  their  litanies, 
Rolling  to  their  lair. 

I  dart,  I  flash,  I  wheel 

From  flower  unto  flower; 
I  hunt  the  dragon-fly  and  steal 
Through  sparry  mine  and  bower; 
Along  the  foam  I  skip 

Where  blanching  billows  flare, 
And  flaunt  the  flags  of  many  a  ship 
Fraight  with  human  care. 

What  is  human  care? 
Lives  it  on  every  mortal  lip? 
Is  it  a  plague,  a  sword,  a  whip? 

Or  flame  or  smoke  or  snare? 

Oh!  swift  I  dance  and  glide 

Over  lake — over  wold! 
On  rusted  weather-vanes  I  ride 

And  crosses  warm  with  gold. 
Of  Love  and  Joy  I  sing 

Or  shape  a  happy  prayer, — 
But  are  those  evil  winds  that  bring 

Mortals  human  care? 

25 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


What  is  human  care? 
For  there  is  no  imagining 
Could  shape  for  me  the  thought  or  thing 

Whether  foul  or  fair. 

In  silences  that  brood 

Where  sun-stained  eagles  fly 
Above  the  storms,  my  brotherhood 

Are  happy!    they  and  I 
Know  not  what  lies  below 

Our  blue  dominions  fair,^- 
Below  the  shadows  naught  we  know,- 

Naught  of  human  care. 

What  is  human  care? 
Some  punishment  men  undergo? 
Some  payment  of  a  debt  they  owe, 

Which  we  cannot  share? 


26 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  SYMBOL  IN  THE  CAVE 

In  a  crystal  cave  I  stood, — 

Drop  by  drop  the  water  ran 
O'er  its  roof  as  runs  the  blood 

Through  the  coral  veins  of  man. 
Drop  by  drop  the  water  fell 

To  the  ground  as  tears  may  fall 
When  the  springs  of  sorrow  well 

From  some  blind  source  mystical. 
Slowly  from  the  crusted  floor 

Rose  the  eager  virgin  cone, 
As  its  bright  mate,  hanging  o'er, 

Loosed  the  silver  from  its  stone. 
Male  and  female  so  they  strove 

Downward,  upward  through  the  dark, 
Peak  to  point,  below,  above, 

Urged  by  passion's  goad  and  spark. 
Some  stood  sundered,  some  had  met, 

Some  were  melting  into  one, 
Some  built  patient  pillars  set 

In  splendor  hidden  to  the  sun. 
So  they  sank  and  so  aspired, 

Though  dead  ages  lay  between, 
So  Love  and  Yearning  fired 

27 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  unseeing  and  unseen. 
And  my  torch  flung  maddened  light 

Through  the  spar-hung  cavern  dim, 
Till  it  seemed  the  grot  grew  bright 

With  presences  of  seraphim. 

In  my  heart's  red  chambers  surged 

Sudden  magic  wild  and  strong, 
As  when  parted  lips  are  merged 

Like  two  words  within  a  song. 
From  my  bosom  rose  a  sigh; 

All  its  fervent  vapor  pearled, 
And  from  my  lips  a  mighty  cry 

Rang  upward  to  the  world : 

O  Love,  where  art  thou?  where 

In  mystery-mazed  night? 
Unveil   thy   face, — declare 

Thee  to  my  aching  sight! 
Oh,  grows  thy  heart  to  mine 

Through  void  and  voiceless  years? 
Oh,  fares  my  heart  to  thine, 

And  lures  it  on  with  tears? 
Let  clouds  and  palls  be  drawn, 

And  the  lodestone  meet  the  steel ; 

28 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Let  deliverance  and  the  dawn 

Soul  unto  soul  reveal. 
So  with  stormy  flame  august, 

Love  my  startled  spirit  stirred, 
All  the  cavern,  all  my  dust 

Trembled — trembled — trembled 

When  the  vatic  force  assembled, 
Risen  round  that  potent  word. 

THE  STALACTITE : 

Adoring,   I  seek  thee  alone! 

The  ocean-wide  reaches  of  years 
I  bridge  with  the  trend  of  my  stone 

And  fathom  this  darkness  with  tears. 
O  crystalline  virgin,  I  bend 

Above  thee,  I  hunger  and  shine. 
Ascend!  O  pale  mistress,  ascend 

To  the  breast  that  is  striving  for  thine! 

THE  STALAGMITE: 

Through  cold  underearthern,  through  nig1ht 
Thy  tears  have  aroused  me  to  glow 

With  an  ecstasy  fixed  by  thy  sight — 
O  Lord  of  my  Life! — see,  I  grow 

29 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


'Neath  caresses  and  soaring  desire 
From  beds  of  the  nethermost  gloom, 

And  thy  tears  falling  on  me  are  fire 

That  shapes,  though  its  passion  consume. 


THE  STALACTITE: 

They  drift,  pass  and  die  as  we  yearn — 

Gray  eons  and  darkness  and  cold; 
Our  crests  still  live  severed  and  burn 

With  the  pent,  sundered  kisses  they  hold. 
Time  dies,  but  our  hope  hath  no  death; 

The  dews  that  I  garner  are  rains 
Of  rapture  I  cast  with  a  breath 

On  thy  head ; — they  are  blood  of  my  veins. 


THE  STALAGMITE: 

I  climb  with  my  listening  spire; 

To  thy  glistening  spire  I  climb. — 
'Tis  a  star  that  still  draweth  me  higher 

And  nigher  through  distance  and  Time. 
What  impulse  exalts  me  and  leads, 

O  King,  to  thy  throne  on  the  height? 

30 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


To  the  heart  that  burns  o'er  me  and  bleeds 
Like  a  torch  o'er  a  gulf  in  the  night? 

THE  STALACTITE: 

Lo!  the  pillars  about  us  that  stand 

Upholding  the  plains  of  the  Earth — 
Obedient  they  joined  at  command 

Of  the  love  that  has  given  us  birth. 
So  I  sink,  so  thou  risest  to  me 

Ere  the  ultimate  clasp  we  attain 
And  grow  one  in  Love's  crystalline  tree 

From  longing,  from  tears  and  from  pain. 

From  the  ether,  from  the  room 

Splendored  by  the  raving  sun, 
To  Earth's  fire-fertile  womb, 

Great  Love,  thy  will  be  done. 
Thy  will  be  done,  O  Law 

Whose  adamant  and  steel 
Mysteriously  draw 

Hearts,  worlds  and  stones  to  feel. 
Go  draw  my  heart  afar 

To  a  heart  beyond  my  sight, 
So  a  star  may  reach  a  star — 

Disclose!  Exalt!  Unite! 

31 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


ATLANTIS 

Westward  the  pillars  slender 

Of  Hercules  it  lay — 
The  land  whose  pride  and  splendor 

Once  burned  beneath  the  day. 
No  more  the  sun  shall  warm  it; 

No  more  man's  footfall  be 
In  Atlantis,   old  Atlantis, 

Atlantis   in  the  sea. 

Above  her  fanes  of  glory 

The  iron  vessel  steamed, — 
The  city  shrined  in  story 

Such  as  no  poet  dreamed. 
I  knew  the  marble  towers, 

The  cold,  white  majesty 
Of  Atlantis,   old  Atlantis, 

Atlantis  in  the  sea. 


An  hundred  fathoms  to  mine  eyes, 
Through  molten  blue  and  green, 

The  sun  that  towered  in  the  skies 
Drew  up  the  deeps  serene. 

32 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Snow-like  the  roofs  and  temples, 
The  streets  with  pearls  strewn  free 

In  Atlantis,  old  Atlantis, 
Atlantis  in  the  sea. 

Silence  in  dead  Atlantis  bode; 

Quenched  lay  her  pride  and  wealth; 
The  scarlet  sea-flags  streamed  and  flowed; 

The  serpents  slipped  in  stealth. 
Pale  blooms  and  shells  bedecked  her  floor, 

And  the  starred  anemone 
In  Atlantis,  old  Atlantis, 

Atlantis  in  the  sea. 

An  hundred  fathoms  to  my  ken 

Rose  white  with  closen  eyes 
A  face — so  to  the  sight  of  men 

The  lost,  loved  women  rise. 
It  smiled  and   shone  and  brightened 

With  strange,   wild  witchery 
From  Atlantis,  old  Atlantis, 

Atlantis  in  the  sea. 

Deep  down  my  heart  lay  hidden 
Where  coral-forests  bloomed; 

33 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Deep  down  my  arms  were  bidden 
To  clasp  the  city  doomed. 

There,  twice  a  thousand  years  agone, 
O  Love,   I   dwelt  with  thee 

In  Atlantis,  old  Atlantis, 
Atlantis  in  the  sea. 


Beneath  the  sunbeams  and  the  ships, 

One  hundred  fathoms  deep, 
Upon  thy  sea-cold  eyes  and  lips 

Roll  tides  of  endless  sleep. 
Would  that  we  twain  were  lying, 

With  thy  hair  flung  over  me, 
In  Atlantis,   old  Atlantis, 

Atlantis  in  the  sea. 


SAN  FRANCISCO  DESOLATE 

Ruin  outraced  the  dawn. 
When  the  ports  of  night  were  drawn, 
The  feast  of  death  lay  spread ; 
The  city  bowed  low  her  head, 
Disconsolate  in  the  morn, 

34 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Sitting  amidst  her  dead — 
Forlorn!  O  forlorn! 

Lo !  how  the  touch  of  day 
Rolleth  in  pity  away 
Over  the  graves  and  the  fires 
And  the  houses,  domes  and  spires 

Abject  and  broken  in  dust. 
Woe  on  thine  ashes  and  pyres, 

Young  Queen,  once  august ! 

Flame  had  goaded  the  ground, 
And  the  valves  of  the  deeps  profound 
Broke  through  their  riven  rock; 
She  felt  the  wrath  of  the  shock 

And  a  storm  upheaved  her  floor; — 
Dawn  saw  the  grace  that  crowned 

My  city  no  more. 

Woe  hath  befallen  thee, 
And  thou  wringest  in  misery 
Thy  bleeding,  despairing  hands 
Over  thine  agonis'd  lands, 

For  a  great  grief  came  to  pass ; 
Thy  beauty  is  prey  to  the  brands, 

My  city,  alas ! 

35 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Thou  weepest,  mother  mine, 
For  the  dear  dead  that  are  thine, 
And  the  dark  tide  of  thy  tears 
Is  one  not  of  days  but  years. 

The  ashes  lie  gray  on  thy  head, 
And  deep  is  thy  wound,  and  thy  biers 

Lie  dense  with  the  dead. 

Splendor  of  thine  and  pride 
Are  departed ;  the  waves  deride 
Thee  and  thy  sisters  sore, 
And  lisp  and  laugh  on  the  shore, 

And  the  sun  is  brave  with  gold, 
But  the  sun  and  the  sea  no  more 

Know  thee — as  of  old. 


Remount,  O  Queen!  resume 
The  throne  of  thy  hills ;  through  the  doom 
And  the  dolor  and  terror  that  reign 
O'er  thy  walls,  thou  shalt  lift  again 

Thy  head.     The  sons  shall  restore 
Anew,  from  the  wastes  of  thy  pain, 

Thy  glory  once  more. 

36 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


O    EVANESCENCE! 
(San  Francisco) 

I  loved  a  work  of  dreams  that  bloomed  from  Art ; 

A  town  and  her  turrets  rose 

As  from  the  red  heart 
Of  the  couchant  sun  where  the  west  wind  blows 

And  worlds  lie  apart. 
Calm  slept  the  sea-flats;  beneath  the  blue  dome 

Copper  and  gold  and  alabaster  gleamed, 

And  sea-birds  came  home. 

But  I  woke  in  a  sorrowful  day; 
The  vision  was  scattered  away. 
Ashes  and  dust  lay  deep  on  the  dream  that  I 
dreamed. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  RUINED  TEMPLE 
(Grace  Church,  San  Francisco) 

A  Temple  in  a  Sunset  Land  I  saw, 

Rent  by  the  throes  of  Earth,  the  storms  of  fire, 
And  o'er  it  brooded  wide  with  spells  of  awe 

The  doom  that  fell  on  Sidon  and  on  Tyre. 

And  many  an  arch  and  ruinous  portal  there 
Stood  stored  with  memories  of  a  perished  time ; 

The  stark  stones  yielded  echoes  of  a  prayer; 
The  towers  quivered  with  a  ghostly  chime. 

Faint  from  the  shattered  font  an  infant's  cry 
Came  forth,  and  soft  the  crumbling  pillars  shed 

The  strains  of  nuptial  music  blithe  and  high ; — 
The  paves  rolled  dolorous  requiems  o'er  the 
dead. 

But  when  the  moon  smote  with  her  wands  of 

white 
The    solemn    wreck   whence   all    these   voices 

poured, 

I  heard  Time's  pinions  beat  across  the  night 
And    saw    the   gleam   of     Death's     annulling 
sword. 

38 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


TO  THE  EARTH-DAEMON 

(An  Orison  sung  in  the  Season  of  the 
Earthquake) 

Chorus  of  All  Living  Things: 

Daemon  of  Earth  underfoot ! 

Source,  yet  solace  of  Ills ! 
Who  sleepest  supine  at  the  root 

Of  the  plains  and  the  hills, 


Ages  lie  spanned  by  thy  breath; 

Thy  pulse  marks  an  eon's  flow  ; 
Thy  sigh  brings  us  harvest  of  death 

When  it  heaves  to  and  fro. 


The  Voices  of  Men  Alone: 

Stir  never  in  slumber  more; 

Seal  fast  the  gates  of  thy  caves ; 
Fields,  cities  and  seas  roof  thee  o'er- 

Our  homes  and  our  graves. 

39 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


May  never  the  core  of  mid-fires 

Stir  thee,  lift  thee  to  wrath, 
Where  the  toil  of  man  aspires 

And  Earth  glory  hath. 

Fair  is  the  planet,  though  storms 

Tear  and  torment  the  air, 
And  Horror  in  myriad  forms 

Rolls  now  here  and  now  there. 

Death  conquers  where  storm-billows  leap ; 

Death  where  the  hurricanes  blow; 
Death  where  flames  tower  and  sweep — 

Is  Earth,  too,  our  foe? 

O  peace!  O  leave  us  the  ground; 

Rest  in  thy  chambers  deep. 
In  thy  granite  vaults  profound 

Sleep  thou — so  we  sleep. 

Our  race  and  its  fruits  of  toil 
In  the  end  thy  gulf  must  fill ; 

Grant  us  peace  of  the  soil ; 
Grant  us  peace  and  be  still. 

40 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Rage  not  like  the  hungering  sea, 
Thou  who  art  heir  to  all. 

What  is  ours  shall  revert  to  thee 
When  Time  bids  it  fall. 

Chorus  of  All  Living  Things. 

Daemon  of  Earth  underfoot, 
Source,  yet  solace  of  Ills 

Who  sleepest  supine  at  the  root 
Of  the  plains  and  the  hills, 


Ages  lie  spanned  by  thy  breath ; 

Thy  pulse  marks  an  eon's  flow; 
Thy  sigh  brings  us  harvest  of  death 

When  it  heaves  to  and  fro. 


THE  RHAPSODIST 

The  slow-unfurling  flags 
Of  Night  droop  in  the  air; 

The  Day's  supernal  master  drags 
Headlong  to  his  lair 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


His  veils  of  mellow  fire, 

His  shrouds  of  rosy  mist 
That  with  a  burning,  yet  a  vain  desire 

His  rolling  flight  resist. 


Gone  is  the  golden  glamour, 

Gone  is  the  vesper  throng, 
Gone  is  the  blithesome  and  melodious  clamor 

Of  birds  in  even-song. 


When  the  day  was  hard  and  white, 
When  it  sinks  to  slumber  and  to  night, 
When  the  Earth  lies  strangely  sad, — 
I  rejoice,  I  rejoice, — I  am  glad ! 


A  lonely  sister-planet 

Burneth  placidly; 
Only  the  sun  can  ban  it, 

Or  bury  it  for  me, 

Or  wrest  its  smile  from  me 
Who  stand  each  night  upon  this  hill, 

Mutely  still, 
And  watch  its  silver  rising  o'er  the  sea. 

42 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


When  all  is  dark  (remember 
There  is  none  but  the  star  and  I), 
On  bended  knee, 
With  a  litany, 

I  adore  that  crystal  ember; — 
Yea,  I  worship  it  utterly! 


O  world  of  light  and  loveliness, 
What  thing  more  beautiful  could  bless 
A  fragment  of  mortality  like  me? 
Then,  as  now,  I  bathe  my  brow 
And  drench  it  with  its  beams, 
And  my  brain  blooms  like  a  garden,  I  vow, 

And  all  its  flowers  are  dreams. 
But  not  with  orisons  alone 
Devotion  to  the  star  I  own, 

For  with  song  shall  I  defend  it, — 
My  pen  with  song 
Shall  be  bold  and  strong 
As  an  archangelic  lance! 
Ah,  could  you  but  know  the  glance 
Of  that  star  you  would  live  but  to  tend  it 
With  tears,  you  would  live  but  to  lend  it 
Your  pale,  rapt  countenance. 

43 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Still  at  night-noon  you  would  wait 

On  a  high  hill  elate 

And  watch  its  silver  rising  o'er  the  sea. 
On  bended  knee 
With  a  litany, 

You  would  worship  it  with  rapture  utterly. 
Though  you  crawl  to  it  half  dead 
For  the  want  of  little  bread, 
You  may  feast  off  fairer  food 
Than  the  glutted  and  the  wolfish  multitude 
That  below  your  marble  mountain, 
Deep  beneath  your  dream, 
Struggle  like  a  maddened  stream 
From  some  black  and  boiling  fountain 
Where  fiery  fevers  gleam. 

Shadows  here!  shadows  there! 
Moiling  in  the  sulphur-steam, 

Toiling  in  the  pale  and  poisoned  air 
Forever,  forever. 
But  you,  ah !  you  shall  never 
Lose  your  starry  joys  whose  stealth 
Builds  the  soul's  eternal  wealth, 

Not  hard  and  haunted  gold. 
Though  men  deny  you  fire 

When  the  year  is  white  and  old, 
You  shall  warm  your  heart  with  a  lyre 

44 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Fallen  from  the  holier,  higher 
Flames  upon  an  astral  pyre, 
And  be  no  more  a-cold. 


So  every  night 

On  my  lone,  lone  height, 
In  rapture 
I  capture 

The  frailest  and  fairest  of  things 

That  the  light  of  my  soft  star  brings, 
For  they  flutter  above  me  with  shimmer 

Of  their  tinted,  moth-like  wings; 
They  are  dreams  that  grow  dimmer  and  dimmer 

As  the  morn-mist  brighter  grows; 
They  die,  O,  they  die !  when  the  glimmer 

Of  morn  is  rich  with  the  rose. 


O  long,  long,  long, 
May  I  kneel  to  my  gentle  star, 

And  I  would  I  might  raise  a  song 

That  might  fly  to  its  flame  divine — 
A  song  in  a  voice  that  is  sweeter  far 

Than  the  voice  that  despairs  in  mine. 
All  through  the  tense  night-hours 

45 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


My  soul  lifts  like  the  ocean 

Lifts  to  the  falling  showers 
Of  the  moon's  omnipotence, 
And  its  every  mood  and  emotion 
To  that  vasty  eloquence, 
Bends  like  a  child  in  a  loving,  mild, 
Devoted  obedience. 

My  passionate,  constant  adoring 

Hath  burthen  of  prayer  and  of  plea; 
It  is  filled  with  an  endless  imploring 
That  the  beam  which  ineffably 

Blesses  my  lifted  face, 
May  burn  each  night  on  the  soaring  height 

Of  this  ancient,  desolate  place, 
Though  it  burn  no  more  for  me, — 
Even  here  on  this  rock-rent  hill 
Where,  ever  alone  and  still, 
On  bended  knee, 
With  a  litany, 

I  watched  its  silver  rising  from  the  old,  imperious 
sea. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


KEATS  AT  WINTER  SUNDOWN 
(Hampstead  Heath,  London) 

I  know,  worn  fire,  that  thou  wilt  rise  again 
Tomorrow  and  on  morrows  dark  to  me — 

But  here,  here  in  my  heart,  there  burns  that  pain 
Of  farewell  deep  as  trouble  of  the  sea. 

It  is  a  grief  unparted  from  the  heart 

As  is  Life's  ruby  fountain  in  its  grot; — 

O  keen,  inseparable  pain,  where  art 
Thou  not  ?  Where  Love  and  Happiness  are  not. 

No  less  I  feel  it  when  I  view  the  rose, 
For  in  a  day  shall  fall  its  loveliness; 

Alas !  I  know,  I  see  it  in  the  close 

Of  this  old,  gray  and  dying  year  no  less. 

Deep  in  the  eyes  of  Beauty  it  reminds; 

It  warns  from  every  song  as  it  is  sung — 
Yet  Earth  again  shall  know  these  in  their  kinds, 

But  nevermore  that  bard  who  died  too  young. 

47 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  TOWER  GARDEN 

(London) 

Grim  granite  and  harsh  flint  the  bastions  rose; 
The  battlements  frowned  gray;  the  moat  was 

deep ; 
Around  me  rang  the  city  in  its  throes, — 

They  were  not  like  my  heart's — which  never 
sleep. 

Here  once  we  sat  when  Spring  compelled  the  air ; 
The  birds  wove  song  and  motion  through  the 

skies ; 

Dreams  sat  within  her  eyes  and  she  was  fair; 
Her  face  was   strange  with   silence  like  her 
eyes. 


We  saw  the  children  play,  but  now  no  more 
I  see  them  through  the  eyes  of  greater  love. 

The  winds'  vast  globes  roll  haunted  and  their 

core 
Is  molten  with  her  voice,  and  memories  rove. 

48 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


This  is  the  self-same  spot;  the  ancient  Tower, 
Eternally  unchanged  beholds  me  come. 

But  O!  it  is  no  more  the  self-same  hour, — 
Old  Earth  has  clasped  her  and  her  lips  are 
dumb. 


LONDON  IN  SNOW 

White,  white  they  lie,  smoke-smitten  roofs  and 

streets, — 
Their     yearlong     black     distemper     blanched 

away; 
Their  faces  and  their  spaces  gray  in  sheets 

Of  splendor  wonder-wrought  are  born  to  Day. 

Air-flocking  armies  seize  the  shackled  town; 
Their  tents  are  bright  on  house-tops  and  in 

fields; 

Their  lances  hang  in  rows,  their  banners  drown 
The    blinded    lawns    that    gleam    like    argent 
shields. 

Clad  on  with  ermine,  lo !  the  muffled  limbs 
Of  trees  grow  shadows  mated  unto  night; 

49 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  roving  eye  is  lured  along  the  rims 

Of  walls  that  stretch  victorious  lines  of  white. 

The  deadened  fall  of  foot  and  hoof  unheard 
Breaks   not  the  fettered   air;  the  wheels   are 
dumb 

On  smothered  ways;  the  sullen  stream  unstirred 
Engulfs  the  swift,  bright  legions  as  they  come. 

Old  dome  and  tower,  pinnacle  and  spire 

Are   charmed   to   crusted   marble   'gainst   the 
clouds 

In  which,  enmeshed,  the  struggling  round  of  fire 
Peers  dim  and  red  across  the  city's  shrouds. 

There  let  her  lie  in  beauty  'neath  the  hems 
Of  mantles  pure,  miraculous  and  cold. 

And    leaden    skies.      Soon    toiling    Town    and 

Thames 
Shall  hold  their  ancient  grayness  as  of  old. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  SEA  AND  THE  CITY 

When  the  dust  of  toil  lies  scattered 

And  robes  the  setting  sun ; 

When  the  town's  dull  day  is  shattered 

And  the  world's  great  night  begun; 
When  Even  ascends  her  station, 
And  Peace  the  throne  of  my  heart; 
When  the  streets  grow  a  desolation 

And  Silence  broods  in  the  mart — 

When  over  the  wastes  oceanic 

The  nightly  lanterns  rise, 
And  the  clouds  are  diaphanic 

Like  love  in  a  young  maid's  eyes, — 
Then  pearls  that  in  buoyant  millions 

O'er  sighing  salt-floods  gleam, 
And  stars  in  their  blue  pavilions 

My  radiant  sisters  seem. 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


THE  THRONE  OF  THE  STORM 

Assembled  in  the  firmamental  plain, 

The  marshalled  clouds  loom  ominous  and  dire, 
Charged  with  fell  thunder  and  the  missile  rain 

And  pregnant  with  their  burthen  of  rash  fire. 

The  rebel  winds  and  armament  of  mists 
Threaten  the  city's  peaks  of  carven  stone; 

The  lances  of  the  lightnings  in  their  lists 
Are  couched  for  battle  by  the  evening's  throne. 

Arrayed  above  the  sunset  red  they  stand — 
The  crests  of  clouds  in  day's  retreating  light, 

While  slow  the  enormous  dusks  on  either  hand 
Roll  up  the  devouring  barriers  of  the  night. 

But  soon  shall  fall  the  bolt  to  strew  them  wide 
In  foray  fierce  across  the  colored  waste 

Where  monsters  now  and  giant  dragons  dyed 
Rich  in  the  edging  sun,  rear  golden-faced. 

O  wait !  ye  lurking  imminences  vast, 

And  powers  abortive  in  your  cloudy  domes ; 
Then  dart  your  blades  from  ambush,  fling  your 

blast 

Upon   your   prey — this   world   of   hearts   and 
homes ! 

52 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  LEPER  OF  LONDON 

In  Euston  Road  in  London  Town, 
I  saw  and  felt  and  wrote  this  down. 

Her  cheek  was  pale,  her  form  was  gaunt; 

She  seemed  so  strangely  thin, 
Thin  as  the  shrouded  ghosts  that  haunt 

Scenes  of  their  earthly  sin. 

She  clutched  my  arm;  with  mordant  words 

Assailed  my  quailing  ear — 
Her  face  was  like  a  starved  bird's ;  — 

Such  speech  do  devils  hear. 

Her  hands  were  clinging  claws  that  burned 
Through  skin  and  flesh  and  bone, 

While  Sorrow  seared  those  eyes  she  turned 
Like  dead  stars  on  my  own. 

That  voice  rose  whirling  to  my  brain 

And  sought  to  shatter  it ; 
I  know  to  demons  its  refrain 

Is  torment  in  the  pit. 

53 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


She  seemed  of  equal  age  with  me, 

Yet  blithe  and  fresh  was  I, 
And  she  was  like  some  blasted  tree 

The  bolts  had  doomed  to  die. 

She  stood  enwrapped  with  charnel  air 

And  pestilence's  breath; 
Harmattan  winds  had  whipped  her  bare 

And  given  her  to  Death. 

It  seemed  his  voice  of  doom  and  blight 
Rang  round  her  like  a  dirge, 

And  from  her  face,  like  spectral  light, 
Gleamed  forth  the  Great  White  Scourge. 

I  looked  upon  a  world  of  woes 

And  peered  through  Horror's  land, 

Then  in  mine  eyes  the  waters  rose, 
And  gold  fell  from  my  hand. 

I  shook  and  drew  my  arm  away 

And  through  the  night  I  fled 
From  deeper  night  that  knew  no  day 

Save  of  the  living  dead. 

54 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


I  felt  the  curse  of  human  things, — 
Man,  Law,  the  strife  of  Earth; 

I  felt  the  thrice-curst  fate  that  brings 
Woe  to  the  babe  at  birth. 

And  those  remorseless  rods  that  fall 

From  palaces  and  domes 
On  worms  that  perish  as  they  crawl 

Athwart  a  nation's  homes. 

One  blessing  mounted  from  the  thought 

And  o'er  my  spirit  fell; 
That  figure  dread  had  dashed  to  naught 

The  realms  of  After-hell. 


MANHATTAN 

Atlantes  of  the  firmament!  abrupt 

The  granite  monsters  of  Manhattan  frown, — 
Phalanx  of  Titans,  stark  and  interrupt, 

Their  tyrannous  grim  bulks  oppress  the  town. 

Their  gonfalons  and  vaporous  plumes  at  play 
Stream  rhythmic  to  the  city's  stormy  beat. 

Her  giant  pulse  that  goads  the  groaning  day 
To  pile  its  mortal  labor  at  their  feet. 

55 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


The  stunned  sea  clasps  the  aching  iron  isle 
That  holds  eternal  tumult  in  its  heart, 

While  Greed's  great  laugh  from  pile  to  towering 

pile, 
Leaps  in  relentless  triumph  o'er  the  mart. 

Incessant  roars  her  fevered  race  of  lives 

Crushed  through  the  sunless  channels  of  her 
stone, 

Or  flung  across  the  paths  where  Mammon  drives 
His  chariot  wheels  o'er  ways  of  flesh  and  bone. 

What  brand  upon  the  brow  of  man?  what  mark 
That  hounds  worn  spirits  toward  a  glittering 
goal? 

Where  Luxury  lifts  her  ashen  husks,  and  dark 
Earth  idols  force  their  usury  from  the  soul. 

O  thunder-wrought  Manhattan !  shaped  of  gold 
Thy  tongue,  thine  eyes  of  blind  basalt,  of  steel 

Thy  smothered  breasts  still  young — yet  bleak  and 

old 
The  mountainous  gray  weariness  they  feel. 

Thy  life  is  eaten  by  thine  eagerness, 

And  round  thy  doomward  sandals  whirlwinds 
roar, 

56 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


And  round  thy  wreck-mad  walls  the  tempest's 

stress 
Riots  from  adamantine  shore  to  shore. 

Now  Anarchs  of  Annihilation  take 

Their  sleep  of  golden  torpor  in  the  glow 

Of  thy  sky-storming  summits — when  they  wake 
What  ruin  red  shall  their  war-trumpets  blow? 


"AN  AMIABLE  CHILD" 
(On  its  Grave  near  Grant's  Tomb,  New  York) 

Dust  of  a  bud  of  Spring, 

Dust  of  a  long-dead  child, 
How  deep  in  saintly  slumber! 
Though  myriad  footsteps  ring 

On  paves  by  crime  defiled, 
Where  woes  of  men  encumber 
These  grasses  wet  and  wild. 

Calm  be  thy  sleep  beside 
The  river  visions  fair, 

57 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Unstirred  by  that  dark  river 
Of  Life  whose  downward  tide 
Bears  wreckage  of  Despair, 
Where  lips,   like  wounds  that   quiver, 
Move  bloody  with  a  prayer. 

Oft  silent  pass  the  hosts 

By  fever-phantoms  led, 
Where  glooms  the  murky  city, — 
Silent  to  thee  as  ghosts 

That  mourn  young  flowers  fled; 
Their  steps  weave  spells  of  pity 
And  memory  o'er  thy  head. 

High  o'er  the  morselled  stone 

The  hero's  pyramid 
In  haggard  granite  towers 
Enormous,  bleak  and  lone, 

But  where  thy  curls  lie  hid, 
Fall  sun  and  rain  and  showers 
Warm  from  the  full  eyelid. 


Thy  grave  seems  like  a  song 
Of  peace  in  iron  frays, 

58 


EWITVJ 

X^KjZ/ 
LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


A  voice  o'er  wastes  of  madness, 
Greed,  misery  and  wrong, 

A  voice  that  might  upraise 
Thy  bright  and  infant  gladness 
To  bless  our  loveless  days. 

O  storm-shod  centuries! 

Here  grow  your  sick  souls  well, 
Where  this  dead  child  is  lying 
'Neath  olden  stones  and  trees, 

Where  one  sweet  word  shall  tell 
Of  a  tenderness  undying 

And  the  heart  where  it  did  dwell. 

BEAUTY  TROVE 

Beauty,  where  dwellest  thou? 

Adores  the  unchanging  sea 
Thy  foam-white  foot  at  dawn 

O'er  some  untrodden  lawn 
Glimmers  thy  starry  brow 

Where  hast  thou  hidden  thee? 

In  the  still  forest  naves 

Do  birds  and  beasts  behold 

59 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Thy  face  in  shrines  of  green? 

Thy  light,  perchance,  is  seen 
In  spar-hung  crystal  caves 

Lavish  with  shattered  gold? 

Mayhap  on  peaks  august, 
'Mid  the  pure  hermit-snows, 

Thy  dance  is  rosy  bright? 
Build  us  a  morn  from  night 

In  this  dim  world  of  dust 

Where  the  cold  death-wind  blows. 

We  seek  thee  where  we  build 

Our  house  of  happiness, 
And  yet  we  find  thee  not. 

Where  lies  the  sacred  spot 
That  with  thy  smile  is  filled? 

Where  Life  may  bloom  and  bless? 

For  we  are  blind  to  Life, 

And  Change  is  like  a  veil, 
Let  thy  presaging  eyes 

Shine  from  these  dunnest  skies, 
Calming  the  iron  strife 

Wherein  our  spirits  fail. 

60 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Thou  hauntest  star  and  sun, 
The  moon,  the  mortal  mind; 

Thou  art  in  eye  and  cheek, 
Spirit  still  hears  thee  speak 

From  shadows,  from  the  dun 
Cloud  and  the  solemn  wind. 

Thou  bidest  still  with  us, 
Though  mists  our  vision  fill, 

Though  oft  thy  robes  be  changed, 
Thy  face  is  not  estranged; 

Thy  rose  miraculous 

Blooms  by  our  pathway  still. 

Raise  us  a  fairer  song, — 
Fairer  than  all  the  Past ! 

Yield  us  thy  draught  divine, 
Blood  shall  grow  rapt  as  wine, 

And  faint  eyes,  waxing  strong, 
See  the  new  realms  thou  hast ! 


61 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


ASSAULT  OF  SILVER 

Eve's  skies  glowed  red  and  resolute, 

The  morn's  were  meek  and  gray; 
Down  sank  a  myriad  angels  mute 

And  dense  their  legions  lay. 

The  muffled  mutiny  of  life 

Strove  with  the  white- winged  host; 

Dull  rang  the  broken  steps  of  strife ; 
The  city  grew  a  ghost. 

A  ghost,  a  spirit  robed  in  white, 

Whose  stains  were  wiped  aw'ay; 
Pure  to  the  slatey  face  of  night 

Like  a  fair  bride  she  lay. 

But  on  the  highways  of  the  town 

The  drifts  were  trodden  stark 
Where  vanquished  flakes  sank  shuddering  down 

To  ruin  deep  and  dark. 

The  streets  grew  grim  with  mire,  but  still 

The  roofs  were  blest  with  white, 
And  gardens  and  the  guarded  hill 

Lay  radiant  to  the  sight. 

62 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


To  the  Presence  of 
WASHINGTON  IRVING 

In  Lindaraxa's  Garden  by  the  fountain, 

I  see  thee,  gentle  phantom,  woo  the  light, — 

Thou  smilest ! — as  fare  forth  the  magic  mountain 
Old  dreams  of  Moorish  glories  reft  from  night. 

Thine  eyes  beheld  their  pageant's  necromancy; 

Thee  living  'mid  these  ruins  now  I  see. 
Thou  didst  reinhabit  them  with  thy  fancy; 

My  fancy  now  reinhabits  them  with  thee. 

The  Alhambra,  Granada,  Spain. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  LOOMS  OF  LIFE 
To  Dr.  Ernst  Haeckel  of  Jena. 

In  a  garden,  in  its  shade, 

Sheltered  from  the  matin-glow, 

Once  I  dreamed  beside  a  maid 
And  longed  new  worlds  to  know. 

For  I  envied  winds  that  blew, — 
I,  who  happy  lived  of  men, 

Envied  all  the  birds  that  flew 
And  was  unhappy  then. 


When  the  sun  shone  strong  and  fair, 
Rash  I  left  the  garden-close ; 

Left  the  maiden  weeping  there — 
A  rose  beside  the  rose. 


Wildwoods  were  aburst  with  song, 
Purple  fell  their  shadows  all, 

Chanting  rivers  danced  along, 
And  roared  the  waterfall. 

64 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


From  the  molten,  rolling  sphere, 

Pleasant  fell  the  sifted  heat 
O'er  my  heart  whose  red  career 

Seemed  tambour  to  my  feet. 

In  a  forest  darkly  cool 

For  a  draught  I  bent  me  down 

O'er  a  sky-blue  painted  pool; — 
My  dangling  locks  shone  brown. 

Soon  the  noon  clomb  to  his  heights 
And  sate  sovereign  o'er  his  sun, 

Where  the  condors  and  the  kites 
Enormous  spirals  spun. 

Black  like  demons  o'er  the  world 

Rushed  their  shadows.     Low  was  hewn 

Straight  the  peak  of  Day  and  hurled 
Down  slopes  of  Afternoon. 

Fallen  fervor  left  the  air; 

Eld  oppressed  the  stricken  light ; 
She  wove  wearinesses  where 

The  East  announced  the  Night. 

65 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Slow  the  blue  and  arching  calms 
Loosed  their  splendor  fire-orbed; 

Winds  grew  sighs  and  slumb'rous  psalms 
The  brooding  Earth  absorbed. 

Thus  was  Night — adown  the  skies 

An  incessant  rumor  sped; 
It  lay  upon  my  heart  as  lies 

A  stone  upon  the  dead. 

Fell  a  lethargy  meseemed 

Over  me — the  ponderous  curse 

Passed,  and  this  the  dream  I  dreamed, 
Lost  in  the  Universe. 

Breaking,  cleaving  earthly  bounds 
Hedged  by  undivulging  sleep, 

Past  the  stellar  lights  and  sounds 
I  plumbed  an  endless  deep. 

Nature  there  with  stilly  eyes 
Reft  of  light  or  living  spark, 

Loomed  upon  a  central  rise, 
A  flame-defended  arc. 

66 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


There  erect  in  awful  state, 

Wrapt  in  cosmic  gloom  sublime, 

Towered  calm,  inviolate, 
The  daughter  of  old  Time. 

Substance  stood  beside  her  throne, 

Robed  with  wonders  strangely  wrought,- 

Force  and  Substance  they  alone 
Her  ministers — and  Thought. 

They  were  giants  beautiful — 

Three,  with  pinions  bright  and  wide, 

All  silent  in  the  sacred  lull 
Where  mysteries  abide. 

Substance  soared  a  seraph  grand, 
Shaped  of  pearl  and  opal-stone, 

With  a  globe  in  either  hand 
At  basis  of  the  throne. 

Force  was  wrought  of  warmer  flame; 

In  his  hands  the  levins  danced; 
Rapture  trembled  through  his  frame 

And  from  his  plumes  it  glanced. 

67 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Thought  of  all  stood  loveliest; 

Fulgent  on  his  brow  the  beams 
Shook  with  lustre  manifest 

To  mortals  but  in  dreams. 

Son  was  he  of  Energy, 

Fashioned  of  his  finer  fires, 
Tall  he  flamed  as  o'er  the  sea 

Some  crater's  torch  aspires. 

Then  with  orbs  that  held  no  more, 

Vapid  in  the  sterile  light, 
I  saw  the  three  great  spectres  bore 

Stark  eyes  devoid  of  sight. 

Eyes  of  iron  or  of  stone, 

Blank  as  waste  infinity, 
While  Nature,  sightless  on  her  throne, 
\     Ruled  o'er  the  sightless  three. 

Eyes  like  deserts  gray  and  dead, 
Or  the  plains  of  stagnant  seas, 

Or  the  parched  moon  overhead — 
Their  eyes  seemed  like  to  these. 

68 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Mute  their  frozen  lips  as  cliffs 
Where  the  unseen  eagle  clings, 

Yet  darkly  great  with  hieroglyphs 
And  weird  with  whisperings. 

As  a  fountain's  water  drips 
Tinkling  on  the  chilly  stones, 

Substance  with  his  lucid  lips 
Spoke  forth  in  crystal  tones : 

"What  thou  hast  I  gave  to  thee; 

Of  my  being's  bulk  thou  art, 
Yet  shalt  thou  return  to  me 

And  render  part  for  part." 

Like  the  roaring  of  a  flame, 

Like  the  breathing  of  the  Flood, 

Then  a  rolling  voice  there  came 
Tumultuous  o'er  my  blood. 

"Into  thee  my  breath  did  pass ! 

Energy  hath  made  to  burn 
That  which  stirs  thy  living  mass 

Yet  shall  to  me  return." 

69 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Like  some  echo  frail  and  far, 

Fell  the  silver  voice  of  Thought, 

Faint  as  trembles  from  a  star 
A  ray  from  gulfs  of  Nought. 

"I  alone  have  raised  thy  state 
O'er  the  flower,  bird  or  gem, — 

Kingly  clay,  yet  co-create 

With  Earth  that  houses  them." 

Then  Nature's  trebled  voice  I  heard, 
Stirring  all  my  smitten  soul 

As  a  smitten  reed  is  stirred 
By  winds  from  off  the  Pole : 

"So  they  blindly  wove  and  weave 
Worlds  as  they  have  woven  thee : 

Let  energy  to  Substance  cleave 
And  Thought  crown  Man  for  me. 

All  I  hold  who  silent  lie, 
Blind  at  Life's  illusive  root ; 

In  me  all  gods  and  ages  die, 
All  suns  grow  cold  and  mute. 

70 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


"I  in  Process  and  in  Plan 
Am  the  sowing,  am  the  seed, 

Am  the  harvest,  and  to  Man 
The  iron  Laws  of  Need." 

Through  that  spell-tormented  gloom, 
Fast  with  Terror's  icy  stress, 

Denser  darkness  fell  like  doom; 
The  voice  grew  less  and  less. 

There  within  their  deeps  alurk, 

Whelmed  in  Chaos,  wombed  in  Night, 

Laboring  at  their  telic  work, 
The  Powers  sank  from  sight. 

Then  the  awful  dusks  were  drawn 

On  the  fateful  potencies 
Blind  and  dead,  where  never  dawn 

Smites  on  their  mysteries. 

All  my  shattered  senses  swam 

And  in  vapor  passed  away 
Ere  the  solar  oriflamb 

Shone  in  my  Earthly  day. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Shone  again,  although  the  year 

Stood  where  sighing  Autumn  grieves 

And  the  Earth  was  burning  sere 
With  storms  of  perished  leaves. 

Now  I  felt  no  more  the  flame 
In  my  heart,  nor  roving  rage, 

And  I  seemed  as  one  that  came 
From  some  long  pilgrimage. 

Slow  I  sought  the  garden-close 
For  a  maiden  mourning  there ; 

Savage  winds  had  wrecked  the  rose 
And  cast  it  on  the  air. 

But  no  maiden  more  I  found 

Though  her  blessed  name  I  cried 

Through  the  garden's  sainted  ground 
And  all  the  World  beside. 

As  a  silent  pool  I  passed 

Toward  the  dying  of  the  day, 

To  mine  eyes  its  silver  glassed 
My  locks  of  ashen  gray. 

72 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Then  a  vision  and  a  light 

Rose  athwart  the  years  I  whiled 

In  the  deeps.    From  out  the  night 
Came  the  crying  of  a  child. 

With  my  yearning  hands  agrope, 
Long  I  erred  within  the  wood, 

Calling  on  the  child  to  hope ; — 
Methought  it  understood. 

Was  it  echo  of  my  voice 

That  within  the  forest  rang? 

Still  it  bade  the  babe  rejoice 
And  once,  I  knew  it  sang. 

Soon  a  tiny  hand  I  grasped 

Which  my  eager  fingers  spanned, 

While  my  other  hand  was  clasped 
Warm  by  a  woman's  hand. 

Then  I  knew  it  was  the  maid 
As  her  woman's  heart  was  prest 

Close  to  mine.    We  long  had  strayed 
Each  on  the  other's  quest! 

73 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


'Neath  the  moon  we  trembled  there ; 

Now  the  infant  lips  were  still, 
And  through  Earth  and  Flesh  and  Air 

We  felt  great  Nature's  will. 


HYMN  TO  THE  PASSING  EARTH 

When  the  cliff  crumbles  and  the  splintered  peak 

Feels  the  sharp  fracture  of  the  frost  and  snow ; 
When  the  fell  deluge  and  the  rivers  seek 

To  drag  green  continents  where  oceans  flow; 
When  moons   are  darkened  and  the  suns  lose 
lustre, 

And  the  worn  axles  of  old  Earth  turn  slow, 
While  stars  in  terror  round  her  orbit  cluster 

To  peer  upon  her  fall  and  overthrow, 
And  all  Creation  in  an  endless  flowing, 

Is  tidal  toward  her  still  and  secret  springs, 
Oblivious  to  his  coming  and  his  going, 

Must  Man  be  numbered  with  her  mortal  things  ? 

Bleak  Time  shall  part  the  worlds  on  roads  of 

thunder, 
Loosen  and  level  and  annul  all  bands, 

74 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Strike    love-linkt    hearts    with     sudden    glaive 
asunder 

And  break  the  clasp  of  fond  and  fettered  hands, 
Still  bid  the  glacier's  monstrous  travail  bear 

Her  icebergs  to  their  oceanic  sire, 
And  from  the  crater's  throat  convulsive  flare 

Doom's  sable  flag  of  ashes  fringed  with  fire. 

O  ancient  anguish  of  the  dry  sea-hollow ! 

And  weight  of  patience  of  the  withered  plains, 
And  valleys  thwarted  of  their  joy — when  follow 

The  winsome  blooms  and  emerald  gift  of  rains  ? 
When  shall  the  tumult  of  Earth's  tides  and 
changes 

Lift  the  sea's  Kraken  to  the  sun-bleached  crags  ? 
When  the  massed,  shelved  and  adamantine  ranges 

Dethroned,  nurse  coral  and  the  salt-ooze  flags? 

Though  all  fair  territories  of  the  globe  be  riven, 

And  weedy  continents  slow-heaving  rise 
From  cloven  foam,   and  dark,   strange  seas  be 

driven 

To  shape  new  shores  'neath  re-assembled  skies, 
Though  Time  shall  strike  a  silence  through  the 
ringing 

75 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Sweet  sisterhood  of  strings  in  human  harps, 
The  hands  that  smote  them  and  the  lips  whose 
singing 

Was  rapture !  blend  with  dust  of  Alpine  scarps, 
Not  these  are  measure  for  Man's  deeds — nor  yet 

The  lives  of  suns  in  the  mutable  Immense, 
Nor  prone  despair  of  unplumbed  distance  set 

Past  baffled  brains  and  closen  shores  of  sense. 

Though  Ozymandias  and  Rameses  win 

No  whisper  of  their  fames  where  darkly  hid, 
The  desert  devours  the  Sphinx  and  locks  within 

Its  breast  lost  Luxor  and  the  Pyramid, 
Though  bronze  betray  its  trust,  and  scriptured 
glory 

Of  great  bards  vanish  like  the  sceptred  kings, 
Must  Man,  on  Nature's  temple  threshold  hoary, 

Groan  at  the  far  futility  of  things  ? 

O  great  gray  question !  still  the  deeps  lie  shrouded 
With  midnights  round  the  word  for  which  we 

yearn. 

What  though  across  the  Future's  peaks  unclouded 
Ne'er   sign   nor   answering   symbol   soar   and 
burn — 

76 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


In  light  and  not  in  shadow  fall  our  race! 

Nor  shall  the  monster  staves  of  Cosmos  blight 
Man  in  his  mundane  majesty  of  place 

Nor  halt  his  march  against  the  evening  height. 


THE  MASTER  OF  MAGNIFICENCE 

Embattled  like  a  phalanx  tall, 

The  sharp  Sierran  summits  gleamed; 

Their  frozen  pyramids  stood  all 

Enchanted  and  their  forests  dreamed. 

Above  their  argent  slopes  the  sun 
Hung  like  a  golden  shield  on  high; 

His  joyous  love  fell  fast  upon 

Their  crests  and  showered  from  the  sky. 

He  saw  where  aureate  valleys  sweep 
Their  leagues  of  wheaten  billows  forth, 

And  marked  two  master  rivers  creep 
To  Ocean,  flowing  South  and  North. 

Then  broke  his  level  flight  of  spears 
Through  passive  airs  a  pathway  free 

77 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


To  where  the  toil  of  myriad  years 

Had  reared  the  deathless  mammoth  tree. 

The  Earth  lay  pregnant  rich  with  ore, 
And  felt  her  sunless  treasures  play 

Like  wonder  in  her  veins,  and  bore 
Her  metals  glittering  to  the  day. 

Raised  not  the  sinuous  vine  her  round 
And  purple  gems  to  charm  his  eye? — 

She  who  drank  rapture  from  the  ground 
And  amorous  fever  from  the  sky. 

The  fields  in  adoration  bent; 

The  orange  burned  to  match  his  fire, 
While  hills  aglow  with  flowers  sent 

Their  paeans  to  their  lord  and  sire. 

So  throned  upon  the  stainless  air, 
He  cast  his  gold  with  royal  hand 

Where  realm  on  realm  spread  wide  and  fair- 
The  peerless  Californian  Land! 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


SONG  OF  THE  SUNDOWN 

Across  the  prone  Pacific  vast, 

Struck  into  emerald  laced  with  white, 

With  gold  enchased,  and  overcast 

With  red,  the  homeless  sun  took  flight. 

Loth  from  the  vantage  of  his  gaze 

The  fast  harmonic  law  compelled 
His  westward  plunge  to  build  the  days 

Round  Orient  ranges  citadelled. 

Magnificent  his  min'stry  trode, — 

The  apparelled   clouds  bore  mountain   crests, 
And  to  their  lord,  as  down  he  rode, 

Offered  their  broad,  emblazoned  breasts. 

Yet  golden,  golden  ran  a  lane 

From  sun  to  city  o'er  the  sea; 
The  trend  of  tides  that  swept  the  plain 

Flickered,  then  crossed  it  brokenly. 

Then  reached  the  blue  horizon  up 
And  seized  the  rondure  of  the  rim 

79 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Of  the  great  globe;  the  ocean's  cup 
Trembled  with  glory  to  the  brim. 

The  fervor  of  his  passion's  thirst 

Sank  slaked  within  the  emerald  wine, 

While  reddening  vapors  curled  and  burst 
Like  fumes  of  myrrh  above  a  shrine. 

So  the  strong  sea  bore  down  the  sun, 
Nor  any  more  his  splendor  fell 

Upon  the  city's  hills,  though  one 
Rose  ghostly  with  a  dim  farewell. 

Yet  for  a  space  two  fiery  lips 

Lay  smouldering  on  the  darkening  green ; 
A  farewell  trembled  to  the  ships, 

And  Day  was  lulled  in  dusk  serene. 

Slowly  aloft  the  landward  skies 

Now  mounts  the  rolling,   argent  sphere; 
The  pointed  stars  unseal  their  eyes 

Each  sharpened  with  a  gleaming  tear. 

Then  one  by  one  the  lamps  awake 
Where  loom  the  city's  barriers  dun; 

Her  streets  begin  to  bloom  and  break 
With  points  of  lustre,  one  by  one. 

80 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  waves  lap  on,  the  breezes  stray; 

Her  stony  pomp  is  robed  in  light; 
She  that  flamed  golden  to  the  Day, 

Now  glitters  silvern  to  the  Night. 


VALE,  CALIFORNIA 

Roaring   to    Southward   rolled   the  train.      The 
night 

Down  firmamental  fields  to  Westward  bore 

Her  arc  of  soft  eclipse,  the  hills  and  shore 
Enfolding,  save  where  sunset  stormed  with  light 
The  spines  of  gilded  peaks  whose  Heavenward 
height 

The  aspect  of  an  earthly  parting  wore. 

Rose  then,  revolving  Day,  whose  splendor  more 
Made  splendid  palm  and  orange  in  my  flight. 

Though  Alps  their  massifs  interpose,  or  sands 
Of  wind-worn,  dappled  deserts  sunder  me 

From  thee,  O  mother,  or  the  floods'  great  awe ; 
Not  siren  cities  nor  enchanted  lands, 

Nor  old  isles  'stablished  in  their  subject  sea, 
From  thee  my  loyalty  and  love  shall  draw! 

81 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  SHADOW  O'ER  THE  CITY 
(San  Francisco) 

Vast  hung  the  moon  o'er  ruins  black  and  prone, 
And  where  the  torn,   flame-stricken  summits 

blight 
The  heavens,  there  crouched  all  vigilant  in  light, 

Two  marble  lions  by  a  palace  lone 

Whose  portals  hungry  weeds  had  overgrown, 
Whose  mangled  walls  gave  ingress  to  the  Night 
And  all  her  stars.     There  Silence  sat  upright, 

Ash-crowned,  and  wrought  a  menace  round  her 
throne. 

Low  in  the  vales  each  litten  thoroughfare 
Trembled,  as  Life,  with  roses  tossing  red, 
Danced  in  her  glittering  garments  through 

the  town; 

But  high  across  the  still,  moon-fettered  air, 
Full  on  the  living  streets  I  saw  the  dead 
Look  darkly  and  inexorably  down. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


LONDON 

Dismay  drags  down  the  condor-plumes  of  Thought 
And  holds  in  pause  the  strive  of  Fancy's  prow 
Where  Time's  behemoth  towers.  Answer,  thou 
Gray  monster  of  the  modern  Chaos  wrought 
Along  the  amazed  meads,  one  flower-fraught, 
What  voices  lure  the  ravens  round  thy  brow  ? 
What  leagues  must  feed  thy  sateless  hunger 

now, 
Ere  to  the  assailant  seas  thy  bourn  be  brought? 

The  island  sinks  beneath  thee,  sinks  though  hewn 
From  granite  of  sea-ramparts,  and  the  land 

Thy  mordant  shadows  gnaw,  fades  like  the  moon 
By  huge,  eclipsing  blackness  struck  and  banned 

In  sight  of  men  who  tremble  at  high  noon, 
Fearing  some  terror  of  the  night  at  hand. 


83 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


TO  MIMIC  POETS 

Why  should  the  poet  dwell  in  vanished  days, 

Deaf  to  his  own  and  blind  to  all  their  light  ? 

Why  piece  old  shattered  gods  or  from  their 

night 

The  ghosts  of  weary  nymphs  and  satyrs  raise 
To  dance  to  measures  false  in  alien  ways 

Within  this  modern  glare  and  fever-blight, 

This  blasting  air  ?  And  yet  there  grow  as  bright 
Now,  as  of  old,  the  imperishable  bays. 

Fair  was  the  Past — how  fair !  and  yet  it  seems 
Fair,  too,  this  age  of  iron  could  be  drawn, 

For  it  hath  mighty  glories  and  great  dreams 
And  powers,  and  a  light  that  is  as  dawn 

To  futures  golden  with  far  richer  themes 
Than  poet  ever  sang  on  Tempers  lawn. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


TO  WILLIAM  BUTLER  YEATS 

Pale  Orpheus  of  the  Celt !  thy  music  pure 
Strikes  flame  once  more  to  Erin's  vanished  light, 
A  flame  whose  soaring  tongues  shall  wreck  the 

night 

That  walled  her  shores.     Shall  not  these  notes 
endure  ? — 

This   rapture  of   clear  harps   that  thrills  the 

stones 
And  wakes  the  saddened  sods  of  thy  lorn  land  ? — 

Of  which  thou  art  a  bulwark,  and  thy  tones 
^Eolian  breath  to  fire  her  heart  and  hand. 

AND  YET— 

Art  thou  not  some  illusive,  moon-white  ghost? — 
Some  exhalation  from  the  fair,  dead  form 

Of  a  long-buried  and  Earth-banished  fay 
Whom  ne'er  thy  lustre  cold,  nor  querulous  host 
Of  phantoms  shall  revive?    This  Age's  storm 
Canst  thou  endure,  and  blaze  of  living  day? 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


ACME! 

Eternal  speech  framed  by  the  planets'  tongue ! 
Stir  me  with  music  of  the  primal  morn 
That  woke  the  worlds  when  first  the  sun  was 
borne 

Exultant  past  his  subject  spheres  that  hung 

Like  ore  the  night  imperious  had  wrung 

Living  from  cosmic  quarries,  and  had  worn 
Extinguished  on  her  brow.   Her  shadow,  shorn, 

Crumbled  when  Day  his  flaming  javelin  flung. 

Roaming  I  sought  that  light  of  great  release, 
So  it  might  loose  me  from  the  clouds  that 

swept 
Westward  my  years  of  youth  and  brought  no 

peace 

Ever  to  my  red  heart  that  clomb  and  crept 
Eager  on  Love's  far  quest  that  could  not  cease 
Till  by  his  torch  my  steps  stood  intercept. 


86 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  SCULPTURED  INDIAN 
(In  the  Bohemian  Grove,   California) 

Image  of  the  vanished  tribes,  this  tree's  enormous 

hollow, 

Holds  thee  as  thou  starest  West. 
When,  O  silent  chieftain,  shall  thy  phantom  foot 
steps  follow 
Them  to  Manitou  and  rest? 

Never  from  the  dim  aisles  of  this  sombre-shad 
owed  valley 

Roamest  thou,  O  lonely  one! 
Brave,  for  thee  the  chase  is  done,  and  done  the 

battle-sally ; 
The  warrior-dance  is  done. 

In  thy  red-shafted  forest  now  an  alien  tongue  is 

waking ; 

Faces  strange  surround  the  feast, 
But  never  to  thy  patient  eyes  shall  dawn  for  thee 

come  breaking, 
Since  thy  night  fell  from  the  East. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Abide,  stern,  steadfast  sentinel,  so  long  as  in  this 

forest, 

Lifts  each  towering  tree  by  tree; 
Thou  bearest  gifts  of  grace  to  us  for  ills  that 

smite  us  sorest, 
Ills  that  force  us  to  the  knee. 


Thy  bronzen  hands  hold  all  we  lost,  the  heritage 

of  ages — 

Son  of  Strength,  we  thank  thee  for 
This  magic  of  thy  woods  and  winds — this  glory  of 

old  pages 
From  the  tome  of  Nature's  lore. 


THE  P^L\N  OF  THE  POPPIES 

Sprent  from  the  hands  of  Spring, 
The  golden  seed  is  falling 

O'er  meadows  loud  with  light, 
And  hills  that  harvest  bring 

When  warm  the  winds  go  calling 
The  poppies  up  from  night, 
Restoring  Earth  her  sight. 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  mountains  sway  with  flame 
Where  the  frail  glories  tremble, — 

Fair  fallen  stars  of  fire ! 
The  valleys  green  acclaim 
The  legions  that  assemble 
In  royal  robe  and  tire. 
With  timbrel,  shawm  and  quire. 


Stained  with  the  ruby's  wine, 
Gilt  by  the  sunset  lustre, 

Swung  by  the  sunset  breeze, — 
So  do  their  beakers  shine, 

So  flare  their  crowns  in  clusters, 
So  bow  across  the  leas 
Like  beacons  o'er  the  seas. 


Afar  in  darker  lands 

I  feel  their  kisses  burning 
As  sweet,  uncertain  lips, 
As  faint,  unhindered  hands 
Are  felt  by  exiles  yearning 
On  shores  when  tears  eclipse 
The  wan  and  westering  ships. 

89 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


THE  SIERRA  SNOW-PLANT 

Thou  growest  in  eternal  snows 

As  flower  never  grew; — 
The  sun  upon  thy  beauty  throwis 

No  kiss — the  dawn  no  dew. 

Thou  knowest  not  the  love-warm  marl 

Of  Earth,  but  dead  and  white 
The  wastes  wherein  thy  roots  ensnarl 

Ere  thou  art  freed  in  light. 

Where  blighted  dawns,  with  twilight  blent, 

Die  pale,  thou  liftest  strong, 
A  tongue  of  crimson  eloquent 

With  one  unceasing  song. 

Thou  glowest  like  an  angel's  thought 

Or  like  a  poet's  word; 
Thy  perfect  peace  is  stirred  by  naught, 

By  naught  thy  dream  is  stirred. 

More  deeply  dark  than  dyes  that  burn 

The  Gorgon's  foaming  vein, 
Thy  calyx-bells  are  red  that  turn 

No  leaves  aloft  for  rain. 
90 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Didst  pierce,  thou  rash,  ensanguined  spear 

The  Galilean's  side 
On  Golgotha,  and  bleedest  here 

By  penance  glorified? 

From  visions  bright  of  worlds  that  lie 
Where  fairer  stars  may  glow, 

Bringst  thou  some  secret  of  the  sky 
Which  man  may  never  know? 

Serene  thy  smile,  past  plaint  or  plea, 

On  star-surrendered  heights 
Where  alps  Sierran  loom  o'er  thee 

And  huge,  companioned  nights. 

x 

O  Life  in  vasts  of  Death!    O  Flame 
That  thrills  the  stark  expanse; — 

Let  Love  and  Longing  be  thy  name! — 
Love  and  Renunciance. 


THE  CALIFORNIAN  POPPY. 

Thou  seem'st  an  ember  from  the  sun, 

A  topaz  from  the  mine. 
Tell,  poppy,  on  what  looms  were  spun 

Those  fragile  robes  of  thine? 

91 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Thy  trembling  torch  ignites  the  hills 
To  youth, — then  opens  gold 

Thy  grail  whereinto  morning  spills 
A  tear  thou  canst  not  hold. 

There  cannot  bide  one  lonely  tear 

In  thy  red  heart  aglow 
With  blood  that  never  pales  with  fear 

Such  as  hearts  human  know. 

Thy  sisters  far  in  mystic  lands 

Their  dream-drowned  chalice  keep, 

And  mould  with  dim,  phantasmal  hands 
Weird,  necromantic  sleep. 

Yet  thou  art  fairer  than  their  dreams, 

O  poppy  of  the  West, 
For  Beauty  seeks  thee  garbed  in  gleams 

That  make  her  manifest. 

'Tis  meet  thy  foliate  gold  should  shine 

Beneath  these  Titan  trees ; 
'Tis  meet  thy  cup  should  sing  with  wine 

By  these  Pacific  seas. 

92 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


For  gold  and  wine  and  sunset  dye 
Thy  beauty's  crown  triune, 

Yet  rouse  the  sad  eternal  sigh 
That  beauty  fades  too  soon. 

O  more  than  emblem  of  the  State 
Where  all  thy  glamour  springs, 

For  thou  art  emblem  of  the  fate 
Of  Earth's  most  lovely  things. 


MARY  OF  MILRONE 

(A    Simple    American    Border    Ballad    of    the 
Southwest) 

I  shot  him  where  the  Rio  flows ; 
I  shot  him  when  the  moon  arose, 
And  where  he  lies  the  vulture  knows 
Along  the  Tinto  River. 

In  schools  of  Eastern  cities  pale, 
My  cloistered  flesh  began  to  fail; 
They  bore  me  where  the  deserts  quail 
To  winds  from  out  the  sun. 

93 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


I  looked  upon  the  land  and  sky, 
Nor  hoped  to  live  nor  feared  to  die, 
And  from  my  hollow  breast  a  sigh 
Fell  o'er  the  burning  waste. 

But  strong  I  grew  and  tall  I  grew ; 
I  drank  the  region's  balm  and  dew, — 
It  made  me  lithe  in  limb  and  thew — 
How  swift  I  rode  and  ran! 

How  oft  it  was  my  joy  to  ride 
Over  the  sand-blown  ocean  wide, 
While,  ever  smiling,  at  my  side 
Rode  Mary  of  Milrone. 

A  flood  of  horned  heads  before, 
The  trampled  thunder,   smoke  and   roar 
Of  full  four  thousand  hoofs  or  more — 
A  cloud,  a  sea,   a  storm. 

O  wonderful  the  desert  gleamed ! 
Man  and  woman,  we  spoke  and  dreamed 
Of  Love-in-Life  till  the  white  wastes  seemed 
Like  the  Plains  of  Paradise. 

94 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Her  eyes  with  Love's  great  magic  shone,- 
"Be  mine,  O  Mary  of  Milrone, — 
Thy  hand,  thy  heart  be  all  mine  own!" 
Her  lips  made  sweet  response: 

"I  love  thee, — yes,  for  thou  art  he 
Who  from  the  East  should  come  to  me- 
And  I  have  waited  long !"  O,  we 
Were  happy  as  the  sun ! 

There  came  upon  a  hopeless  quest, 
With  hell  and  hatred  in  his  breast, 
A  stranger  who  his  love  confest 
To  Mary  long  in  vain. 

To  me  she  spake:   "O  chosen  mate, 
His  eyes  are  terrible  with  fate, — 
I  fear  his  love,  I  fear  his  hate — 
I  fear  some  looming  ill !" 

Then  to  the  church  we  twain  did  ride ; 
I  kissed  her  as  she  rode  beside. 
How  fair! — how  passing  fair  my  bride 
With  gold  combs  in  her  hair! 

95 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Before  the  Spanish  priest  we  stood 
Of  San  Gregorio's  Brotherhood — 
A  shot  rang  out !  and  in  her  blood 
My  blue-eyed  darling  lay. 

0  God !    I  carried  her  beside 

The  Virgin's  altar  where  she  cried, — 
Smiling  upon  me  ere  she  died : 
"Adieu,  my  love,  adieu!" 

1  knelt  before  Saint  Mary's  shrine, 
And  held  my  dead  bride's  hand  in  mine, 
"Vengeance,"  I  cried,  "O  Lord,  be  Thine, 

But  I  Thy  minister!" 

I  kissed  her  thrice  and  sealed  my  vow, — 
Her  eyes,  her  sea-cold  lips  and  brow, — 
"Farewell!  my  heart  is  dying  now, 
O  Mary  of  Milrone!" 

Then  swift  upon  my  steed  I  leapt ; 
My  streaming  eyes  the  desert  swept ; 
I  saw  the  accursed  where  he  crept 
Against  the  blood-red  sun. 
96 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


I  galloped  straight  upon  his  track, 
And  nevermore  my  eyes  looked  back; 
The  world  was  barred  with  red  and  black ; 
My  heart  was  a  flaming  coal. 

Through  the  delirious  twilight  dim 
And  the  blank  night  I  followed  him ; 
Hills  did  we  cross  and  rivers  swim, 
My  fleet-foot  horse  and  I. 

The  morn  burst  red,  a  gory  wound, 
O'er  iron  hills  and  savage  ground, 
And  there  was  never  another  sound 
Save  the  beat  of  my  horse's  hoofs. 

Unto  the  murderer's  ear  they  said : 
"Thou'rt  of  the  dead !— thou'rt  of  the  dead !" 
Still  on  his  stallion  black  he  fled 
With  death  on  his  path  behind. 

Fiery  dust  from  the  blasted  plain 
Burnt  like  lava  in  every  vein, 
But  I  rode  on  with  a  steady  rein, 
Though  the  fierce  sand-devils  spun. 

97 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Then  to  a  sullen  land  we  came, 
Whose  earth  was  brass,  whose  sky  was  flame 
I  made  it  balm  with  her  blessed  name 
In  the  Land  of  Mexico. 

With  gasp  and  groan  my  poor  horse  fell — 
Last  of  all  things  that  loved  me  well! 
I  turned  my  head — a  smoking  shell 
Veiled  me  his  dying  throes. 

But  fast  on  vengeful  foot  was  I; 
His  steed  fell,  too,  and  was  left  to  die; 
He  fled  where  a  river's  channel  dry 
Made  way  to  the  rolling  stream. 

Red  as  my  rage  the  huge  sun  sank; 
My  foe  bent  low  on  the  river's  bank 
And  deep  of  the  kindly  flood  he  drank, 
While  the  giant  stars  broke  forth. 

Then  face  to  face  and  man  to  man, 
I  fought  him  where  the  river  ran, 
Where  the  trembling  palm  held  up  its  fan 
And  the  emerald  serpents  lay. 

98 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  mad,  remorseless  bullets  broke 
From  tongues  of  flame  in  the  sulphur-smoke  ;- 
The  air  was  rent  till  the  desert  spoke 
To  the  echoing  hills  afar. 

Hot  from  his  lips  the  curses  burst; — 
He  fell! — the  sands  were  slaked  of  thirst; 
A  stream  in  the  stream  ran  dark  at  first, 
And  the  stones  grew  red  as  hearts. 

I  shot  him  where  the  Rio  flows; 
I  shot  him  when  the  moon  arose, 
And  where  he  lies  the  vulture  knows 
Along  the  Tinto  River. 

But  where  she  lies,  to  none  is  known, 
Save  my  poor  heart  and  a  lonely  stone 
On  which  I  sit  and  weep  alone 
Where  the  cactus-stars  are  white. 

Where  7  shall  lie  no  man  shall  say, 
The  flowers  all  are  fallen  away; 
The  desert  is  so  drear  and  gray, 
O   Mary  of  Milrone! 

99 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


HEIGHTS  AND  DEPTHS 

Nature  once  heaved  her  mountains'  heads  aloft, 
So  we,  her  children,  might  on  them  respire 
Her  airs  serene  and  pure,  immune  from  mire 

Of  valleys  and  their  highways  trodden  soft 
By  herds  oblivious  to  the  stars  and  skies 
And  the  white  heights  of  yearning.  Haughty 

peaks, 
Oh,  he  alone  shall  mount  you,  he  who  seeks, 

August  with  anger,  from  dark  roads  to  rise. 


ARCHITEKTON 

Let  us  be  Master-builders — not  alone 
Builders,  but  Masters  let  us  strive  to  be, 
And  raise  our  temples  to  Futurity 

In  spirit  as  in  everlasting  stone. 

Creators  true  to  mind,  may  still  the  soul 
Of  Beauty  rule  us  and  our  fanes  erect ! — 
A  sovereign  Artist  is  the  Architect 

And  Master  of  the  Dream-inspired  Whole. 

100 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


FRIEDRICH  NIETZSCHE 

Upon  the  peaks  of  his  proud  labor  flares 

Not  yet  the  light  that  charms  the  myriad  eye ; 

Serene  they  pierce  Time's  undivulgent  airs 
And  bide  their  dawn  from  out  a  younger  sky, 


Till  some  revealing  orb  shall  heave  its  spears 
And  loose  the  lips  enchanted  in  the  stone — 

Then  shall  old  ruins  topple,  and  all  ears 
Of  Earth  be  startled  with  a  thunder  tone. 


The  voice  of  Zarathustra  from  the  crag 

Shall  ring  o'er  regions  red  with  human  rust: 

From  their  embattled  walls  his  word  shall  drag 
Eidolons  grim  of  epochs  gray  with  dust. 


But  now  the  clouds  immerse  the  Titan — hark! 

His  iron  footsteps  and  their  echoes  vast 
Crashing  across  the  Age's  cloistered  dark 

And  trampling  down  the  gods  that  held  the 
Past! 

101 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


PROLOGUE  IN  HEAVEN 
(A  new  Translation  from  Goethe's  Faust) 

The  Lord.     The  Heavenly  Legions,  then 

Mephistopheles. 
The  Three  Archangels  advance. 

RAPHAEL: 

In  olden  wise  the  sun  is  blending 

With  brother-spheres  his  rival  song, 
And  now  with  thunder-tread  is  ending 

His  predetermined  journey  long. 
His  aspect  gives  the  angels  power, 

Though  none  his  secret  fathom  may, 
The  mystic  orbs  of  splendor  shower 

Their  light  as  on  the  primal  day. 

GABRIEL: 

And  swift  with  swiftness  unabating, 
The  Earth  revolves  her  glory  bright, — 

Elysian  lustre  alternating 

With  deep  and  terror-mantled  night. 

102 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


The  ocean  foams  in  broadest  surges 
And  up  the  towering  cliffs  it  rears, 

And  cliffs  and  seas  sweep  on  where  urges 
The  swift,  eternal  flight  of  spheres. 


MICHAEL: 

And  tempests  roaring  and  contending 

From  sea  to  land,  from  land  to  sea, 
Weave,  in  their  rage,  a  chain  expending 

Afar  its  potent  empery. 
The  path  before  the  thunder  clearing, 

Now  flashing  desolations  play, — 
Yet  here  Thy  servants,  Lord,  revering 

The  mild  mutations  of  Thy  day. 


THE  THREE: 

The  vision  gives  the  angels  power, 
Since  none  Thy  being  fathom  may, 

And  all  Thy  orbs  of  splendor  shower 
Their  light  as  on  the  primal  day. 


103 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


A  DEDICATION 

Mundane  Muse — White  Lady  Mine! 
Take  this  tribute,  wholly  thine; 
Take  this  sheaf  of  morning  song, — 

It  is  all  the  Past  can  give; 
My  fairer,  richer  fields  belong 

To  thee — and  I  must  live 
To  bind  their  harvest  wealth  and  lay 

It  safe  from  burning  and  from  blight, 
Before  thy  feet  while  it  is  day 

And  day  is  golden  in  our  sight ; 
While  leaping  Time  still  laughs  with  us, 
And  young  Earth  blooms  miraculous, 
And  Life  is  watered  with  the  spring 

That  bids  me  labor  still  and  sing. 


THE  QUEST  AT  END 

In  white  light  of  the  day-star 
Darting  down  its  ardent  beams,- 

Till  the  white  became  a  gray  star, 
I  walked  within  my  dreams. 

104 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


In  haunting  of  the  moonlight 

Shaking  all  its  silver  staves, 
I  sought  a  ghost  within  the  night 

By  old  forgotten  graves. 

'Neath  roadways  of  the  giant 

Solar  zones  enlaced  as  one, 
Where  seed  of  suns  and  gyrant 

Fogs  of  fire  teemed  and  spun. 

By  pale  and  astral  powers 

Calling  on  a  spirit  blest, 
'Mid  ashen  tombs  and  towers, 

I  wandered  on  my  quest. 

By  comet-flame  I  wandered 

Where  it  plunged  with  glaring  shroud,- 
The  winged  years  I  squandered 

And  cried  a  name  aloud. 


Never  Night  nor  her  rolling, 
Argent  lusters  o'er  my  head, 

Nor  my  thin  voice,  nor  the  tolling 
Of  bells  awoke  my  dead. 

105 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Then  fans  of  dawn-glow  fired 
The  clouds  to  golden  spume; — 

Mine  eyes  in  gloom  expired, 
In  massy  deeps  of  gloom. 

In  the  dew  on  a  lowly 

Mound  of  grass  I  fell  a-swoon, 
All  my  senses  lulled  in  holy 

Veils  with  Lethe-waters  strewn. 

I  wakened  when  a  twilight 

Burned  along  its  reach  of  flame ; 

My  lips  lay  on  a  flower  bright — 
And  that  flower  bore  her  name. 

BIANCA 

Bianca !    Bianca ! 
Thine  eyes  are  like  a  Sybil's  eyes, 

For  they  are  molten  with  the  night , 

They   hold    a    strange,    sequesters   light 
That  to  some  golden  future  flies 

From  out  some  golden  past ; 

Yea,  they  are  overcast — 

Bianca ! 

With  mystery  and  stellar  sheen, 
Liquescent,  calm  and  vespertine! 

106 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Bianca !    Bianca ! 
Thy  mouth  is  like  a  muse's  mouth 

Of  coral  to  a  flageolet — 

A  chanting  muse  whose  lips  are  wet 
With  nectar  never  knowing  drouth, 

And  when,  immersed  in  dreams, 

Their  music  stifled  seems, 

Bianca ! 

They  make  a  living  lute  that  hoards 
Old  memories  in  its  silent  chords. 

Bianca !    Bianca ! 
Shouldst  thou  unleash  thy  trammeled  hair, 

And  crown  thee  with  a  myrtle  crown, 

And  sable  torrents  rushing  down, 
Blot  ivory  shoulders  warm  and  bare, 

Lo !  pipes  of  Pan  would  call 

Thee  to  his  festival, 

Bianca ! 

And  thou  wouldst  dance  away  and  leave 
The  saddened  world  and  me  to  grieve. 


107 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  MOON  DAMOZEL 

The  moon  her  silver  sickle  lifts 

As  though  to  shear  the  phantom  thread 
That  binds  the  live  world  to  the  dead, 

Yvonne ! 

See,  through  the  rifts 
Of  plunging  clouds  she  darts  and  drifts — 
Yvonne!  O  Yvonne! 

She  haunts  and  hounds  us  through  the  grove 
Thou  lingerest,  thou  growest  cold; 
Thou  growest  strangely  still  and  old, 

Yvonne ! 

Thine  eyeballs  rove. 

What  demon  comes  to  plague  thee,  love? 
Yvonne!  O  Yvonne! 

Thy  face  grows  stone  like  yonder  sphere 
Of  ghostly  ashes,  dust  and  death. 
Thy  breath  is  not  a  mortal's  breath, 

Yvonne ! 

Thine  eyes  no  tear 

Unloose — thou  starest  nor  dost  hear, 
Yvonne!  O  Yvonne! 

'108 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


On  the  cold,  blasted  orb  thine  eyes 
Glare  petrified  with  awful  power: 
Alas !  for  us  this  is  the  hour, 

Yvonne ! 

That  our  love  dies. 
The  living  sink, — the  dead  arise, 
Yvonne!  O  Yvonne! 

Go,  spirit,  seek  thy  planet  dread ; 
The  slavery  of  thy  spells  is  past, 
The  dim,  sad  sphere  is  overcast, 

Yvonne ! 

And  on  thy  head 

And  mine,  Love's  blooms  droop  sere  and  dead, 
Yvonne!  O  Yvonne! 


109 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


RUSSIA  AGONISED 

MCMV 

Unhappy  land!  thy  heavens  with  horrors  hung, 
Reveal  no  promise  of  a  day ;  thy  plains 
Shake  in  each  grassy  blade  rebellious  swords 
Sprung  from  the  mad  root  of  Revolt;  thy  peaks 
In  protest  cry  more  awful  than  the  tongues 
Of  seers  on  winds  of  ashen  yestermorns. 
Thy  cities  scream  in  blood,  and  on  their  domes 
Of  empire  glares  red  desolating  light  [seas 

Launched  from  the  pyres  of  doom.    Thy  stained 
Roll  dark  to  Death's  horizons  and  are  thronged 
With  hostile  apparitions  vast  with,  ruin, 
And  Havoc  riots  'round  thy  wintry  walls. 
So  fated  fell,  since  fated  long  to  fall,  [sides 

Thy  wave-borne  armaments,  though  close  their 
Compassed  with  flame,  armored  and  reinforced 
With  triple  steel  and  round  with  thunders  ringed, 
Yet  futile  flashed  their  bolts,  by  hands  enslaved 
Directed  on  their  resolute  enemy. 

Low  lie  thy  citadels  impregnable  [stones 

That  seemed,  and  so  had  been,  were  all  their 
Buttressed  by  freemen's  hearts  and  not  by  hands 
Of  bondmen,  were  not  ravelins  and  redoubts, 

no 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Or  glutted  guns  or  swords  their  sole  defense, 
But   Liberty's   great    Word — that   power   which 
Of  every  heart  a  host,  of  every  host  [makes 

Unconquered  multitudes  thrice  multiplied. 

How  still  on  Asian  wastes  thine  armies  rest, 

O  Russia!  In  those  alien  fields  afar 

What  sleep  lies  on  those  legions  harnessed  once 

In  pomp  and  panoply  of  battle !  Spurred 

With  warlike  hauteur  huge,  they  spread  athwart 

The  trampled  leagues  in  fluttering  shadows  cast 

From  banners  burning  terribly  with  wrath 

And  pallid  flames  of  swords!  They  seemed  wide 

Of  clashing  corn,  stalwart  beneath  the  sun    [fields 

And  valiant  in  the  shade  of  trees.    Then  sank 

Destruction  and  the  air  was  wild  with  wings 

Of  liberated  lives  and  wet  the  ground 

With  many  rains  of  red  that  on  Death's  couch 

Lay  heavy.     Now  the  might  of  Muscovy 

Cumbers  the  richening  sod  whose  delving  worm 

Holds  revels  on  its  pride.     And  the  great  sun 

Sends  salvoes  of  his  beams  athwart  those  plains, 

Saluting  peace,  when  his  recurrent  morns 

On  desolation  burst. 

in 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


If  yet  with  arms 

Resistance  seek  revenge,  or  if  defeat 
Piled  on  defeat  no  counsel  lend,  if  pride 
Clear  paths  for  massacre,  or  folly  throw 
The  sanguine  ports  to  slaughter  open  wide 
In  the  Manchurian  lands, — if  in  these  things 
Declared,  no  wiser  word  for  thee  is  carved 
Full  on  thy  brow,  O  broken  government, 
Then  art  thou  wholly  doomed.     Doomed  though 

the  sands 

Of  Volga  were  outnumbered  by  the  lives 
That  wait  in  hecatombs  on  sacrifice 
Yet  minish  never, — doomed  though  Ural's  peaks 
Turned  giants  and  for  thee  bestrode  those  zones 
Thou  covetest,  and  doubly  doomed  though  all 
Thy  coasts  were  adamant  with  treasure  massed, 
And  gold  thy  long-drawn  shores.     So  tyranny 
Is  weakest  still  in  that  whereon  her  might 
She  bases,  and  the  brands  her  vassals  wield 
Are  rushes  to  her  foes,  but  steel  to  her. 

Full  to  thy  front  thy  children  rise,  and  dread 
And  holy  is  the  wrath  that  masters  them, 
By  angels  urged, — wrath  that  shall  master  thee, 
Albeit  the  pavements  of  thy  capitols 

112 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Are  faint  beneath  their  slaughtered,  and  the  snows 
Of  far  Siberian  wastes  engulf  thy  sons.         [chill, 
Though  woeful  whips  and  chains  and  dungeons 
Or  midnights  of  infernal  mines  thine  arms 
Remorseless  be,  vain  is  their  service  dire ! 
Though  veiled  and  ikon-guarded  shrines  a-gloom 
With  superstition  and  the  blinding  craft 
Of  priests  may  over  despotism  cast 
Anointing  oils  divine  and  bless  with  breath 
Of  sanctity  its  abhorrent  head  and  brow, 
Black  with  a  nation's  woe,  yet  is  its  fall 
Announced  in  terror's  thunders  now  unpent 
In  yon  red  heavens  with  awful  scriptures  stamped. 
There  floods  of  marshalled  doom  brim  down  the 
Enwombing  ills  unknown.  [skies 

Awry  thy  pomp 

On  its  marmorean  pillars  leans,  while  Fear 
Feeds  on  thy  palace  walls  and,  shaking,  hears 
Thy  millions  muttering  on  all  the  winds. 
The  generation's  surges  take  on  crests 
And  whiten,  by  no  captaincy  controlled, 
By  age-gray  wrong  aroused,  by  misery  scourged, 
To  madness.    Lo,  they  mount  to  overwhelm 
With  wrath,  the  thrones  of  Tyranny  upreared 

113 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


On  bases  steep  with  clamor  and  in  blood 
Submerged  and  tears  that  only  blood  can  quell. 
The  sum  of  crescent  ages  hath  annulled 
With  light  thy  iron  barriers  set  with  hate 
Within    Progression's    path,    hath    raised    from 
More  humane  than  thy  laws,  the  incubus     [hearts 
Of  night  thy  hands  imposed,  O  riven  realm. 

Yet  bright  as  standards  waving  in  thy  North, 

Whose  glory  stirs  the  snows  with  vagrant  fire, 

So  yet  for  thee,  to  wisdom  reconciled, 

The  flames  of  torn  Odessa  may  be  dawn 

Of  greatness  that  builds  not  on  leagues  of  land, 

But  always  on  that  Liberty  whose  star 

Is  safeguard  of  all  empire.    So  erect 

Thy  state  upon  humanity,  so  lay 

Its  fundaments  in  Freedom,  its  defense 

In  men's  enfranchised  hands  that  never  foe 

Nor  age  shall  gnaw  its  fabric  into  dust. 

From  shallows  and  dark  shoals  of  adverse  fate, 

Tremendous  with  thy  loss,  may  fountains  spring 

Of  good,  thee  not  alone,  but  all  mankind 

To  quicken  and  refreshen.     May  that  thought 

Which  hath  thy  glory  been  if  not  thy  guide, 

Still  shoot  new  fibres  through  the  families 

Of  men  and  bind  as  brothers  many  a  race 

114 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Extended  to  the  dwindling  margins  dim 
Of  the  green  world.     So  shall  thy  virile  veins, 
All  inexhaustibly  regenerate, 
Flow  on  till  Life's  defoliated  tree 
Trembles  with  all  its  ultimate  bright  fruit, 
The  seraph's  heritage,  the  gods'  great  dower, 
Unending  Peace,  Earth's  bridal-kiss  with  Time. 

SOULS  OF  MEN  ASUNDER 

Chill  the  poisoned  winds  and  dank  that  o'er  the 

world  are  blowing, 
Shake  with  frost  a  breast  that  feels  thy  breath 

in  all. 

Evermore  shall  friendship's  singing  streams  be 
tween  us  flowing, 

Once  with  love  and  laughter  golden,  run  with 
gall. 

Long  to  me  shall  now,  alas,  the  grieving  surge 

of  Ocean 
Drone    with    lonely    tides    lamenting    on    this 

shore, — 
'Mid  that  wreck  of  hearts  and  dreams  and  shells 

of  dead  emotion, 

Where  those  pearls   we  gathered?     gathered 
now  no  more. 

us 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Fair  our  habitation  shone,  with  mouths  of  music 

fluent, 

Pure  of  love  created,  o'er  the  stormy  coasts ; 
Hollow  lies  the  house  and  all  its  melody  fled 

truant ; 

Chambers   hiss   with   adders,   windows   gleam 
with  ghosts. 

Stars  have  burst  while  vast  in  thirst  the  reddened 

leagues  lay  parching; 
Realms  have  sunk,  and  torn  with  tears  were 

nations'  eyes; 
Armies   flamed   and  perished   while  their   glory 

kept  on  marching, 
Yet  the  faith  we  held  it  died  not, — now  it  dies. 

Wider  than  the  world  is — wearier  than  the  floods 

that  sunder, 

Fall  our  paths  apart  on  Earth  nor  meet  again. 
Old  and  cold  the  legend  and  its  end  is  woe  and 

wonder, 

Havoc's  heel  in  hearts,  and  dust  of  Death,  and 
Pain. 


116 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


HOW  COULD  MEN  HATE  THEE, 
LUCIFER? 

Son  of  the  Morning,  thou  whose  arm  erects 

Full  o'er  yon  Orient  wastes  thy  towering  torch, 

A  pharos  guiding  argosies  of  dawn 

Up  through  the  ruins  of  the  night, — we  mark 

Athwart  the  plinths  of  Heaven  implacable, 

Thy  seraph  head  unbowed!    Unbowed  thy  form, 

In  glimmering  outline  traced  and  phosphor  glow, 

Beneath  its  burthen  of  damnation  thrones 

Full  on  Earth's  proudest  peak,  nor  yet  thy  feet — 

Worn  feet!  that  toil  o'er  planetary  ways, 

Kiss  of  that  Earth  disdain,  so  loved  by  thee. 

How  could  men  hate  thee,  Lucifer?     Not  thee 

Rash  coals  of  wrath  unquenchable  impelled 

To  huge  rebellion,  but  solicitude 

And  charitable  intent  unto  man. 

What  could  deter  thee  from  thy  task  benign, 

O  Bearer  of  the  Light,  though  on  thy  head 

Exile  fell  heaped  and  iron  punishment, 

Loss  of  the  olden  bliss  and  sorrowful  doom? 

Foe  wast  thou  but  to  Night  and  Ignorance ; 

Thy  ray  rent  all  their  palls,  their  curtains  torn 

Sank  cowering  in  collapse,  and  man  rose  free 

117 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


To  shrine  in  temples  of  the  intellect 

Th'  untrammeled  thought.     Fear  lived  no  more 

When  frailty  fell !    Far  nobler  fate  to  err 

In  freedom's  light  supreme  than  doubt  or  pray 

In  charmed  darkness.    Thou,  O  Lucifer, 

Art  figure  less  of  Evil  than  of  Sorrow, 

Nor  bearest  Light  alone,  but  Love  also, 

Since  both,  co-ordinate  with  good  in  thee, 

Not  in  their  essences  contend  but  one 

Are  and  inseparate  remain.    So  one 

With  thee  in  nature  and  in  glory's  crown, 

Thy  mortal  sons,  nor  less  their  doom  decreed 

Than   thine,    those    beacon-bearers    through    the 

When  massy  and  cohorted  Ignorance       [glooms, 

Sat  battlemented  by  dark  books  and  turned 

The  iron  leaves  with  crimson  fingers  dipt 

In  cores  of  starry  lives.    Victorious  long, 

These  minions  of  the  midnight  and  the  dusk, 

Ere  shattered  by  the  illuminating  lance 

That  on  their  numberless  proud  summits  fell. 

Like  thee  thy  sons  first  taught  that  brains  could 

beam 

And  spirit  shine,  and  built  of  ashlars  up 
The  dawn-tipt  turrets  and  pavilions  bright 
Whereon  burnt  cresset-fires  for  Pioneers 

118 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Of  Light  their  thankless  labors  to  illume. 
For  thankless,  thankless  still,  O  Lucifer, 
The  labors  of  the  Light,  with  hatred  paid, 
With  pain,  with  persecution  paved  along 
Their  dolor's  path,   with   thorns,   with  hunger's 

teeth, 
With  flints  of  shame,  with  death  and  frenzied 

fires 

Insatiably  fed,  with  swords  and  gyves 
Laid  on  the  limbs  of  pale,  tormented  Truth, 
And  dungeon-dusks  to  overwhelm  her  ray 
That  cannot  die.    Ever  such  fate  hath  fallen 
On  spirits  lustre-fraught,  since  first  deposed 
From  noons  of  state  ineffable  in  Heaven, 
'Mid  acmes  rapt  of  archangelic  awe, 
The  skies  precipitous  absorbed  thy  plunge 
Immense  that  down  the  empyrean  lay. 
Calcined  to  ash,  Heaven's  zones  burned  bright 

with  thee, 

Till  in  this  nether  dome  lay  terminate 
Thy  course  and  whelmed  the  lords  of  dawn's 

domain 

Where  thou  in  vast  magnificence  art  now 
Throned  Monarch  of  the  Morning. 

119 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


What  of  him, 

Titan  of  noblest  heart,  of  fable  old, 
Prometheus,  who  on  stormy  Caucasus, 
Lies  o'er  bleak  leagues  of  granite,  fast  in  chains 
By  Hermes  forged  remorseless,  and  endures 
Intolerable  torment  and  the  bird 
Of  dreadful  beak?    Though  long  the  winters 

white 

Build  up  their  emerald  and  crystal  walls 
With  guards  of  glassy  spears,  though  skies  of 

slate 

Pile  snows  on  snows  upon  him,  till  his  form 
Marks  eminences  strange  along  the  peaks 
Of  that  wild  range,  or  suns  their  malice  dart 
Through  the  insufferable  summers  on  his  flesh 
Exposed,  yet  never  the  harsh,  arid  airs 
Lift  up  his  plaint  to  Jove — no  wail,  no  plaint 
Ascends,  the  exulting  tyrant  to  appease. 
But  oft  his  agony's  red  couch,  though  big 
With  sufferings  ultimate,  grows  strangely  soft, — 
Then,  lo,  the  heartless  stones  start  into  flowers 
Of  clasping  petals  pure,  enstarred  with  dew, 
While  the  exhaling  rose  upon  his  wounds 
Breathes  balms  and  essences  of  sighs.    He  smiles 
Upon  the  dreams  that  men,  his  children,  joy, — 

120 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Fruit  of  his  travail  consummate,  though  paid 
By  him  with  many  a  pang.    So  mounts  his  thought 
Triumphant  and  his  wan  face  wings  a  smile 
Up  to  the  thunder's  throne  and  looming  Zeus. 

How  could  men  hate  thee,  though  the  gods  do 

hate? 

Remote  in  distance  and  on  heights  remote 
Dwell  they  who  thence  deliver  unto  man 
Lumens  of  soul,  since  ever  Light  must  seek, 
Or  ineffectual  its  radiance  falls, 
The  solitude  of  peaks  exalt  and  chill, 
Where  thrones  aerial  lift  and  fence  their  calms 
With  silence  from  the  Earth-enveloping  winds 
That  there  may  never  war. 

Bearers   of  Light 

Immortal,  even  ye  who  higher  climb 
The  Earthen  eminence  than  those  you  bless 
With  glorious  gift,  none  other  lot  await, 
None  other  meed  than  Lucifer's  or  doom 
Of  the  bold,  fettered  Titan.     Isolate 
In  unsurrender  of  your  souls,  immune 
From  injury  on  far  heights  of  soaring  thought 
Piled  firm,  and  'mid  incomparable  climes 

121 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Of  contemplation  fixed,  yet  may  you  smile 
Unshaken  in  serenity  that  holds 
Not  change,  nor  joy,  nor  suffering.    Yet  it  holds 
A  sadness  like  the  sea's  or  his  who  casts 
About  him  oft  the  mourning  of  the  clouds 
With  all  their  tears,  that  deeper  grief  to  hide 
From  which  shall  nevermore  exempted  be 
All  dreamers  and  all  souls  whose  sovereign  sight 
Is  lustre  undefeated,  though  new  dawns 
Drown  in  their  cumulative  floods  the  beams, 
No  less  eternal,  of  each  vanward  star. 


122 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  IRON  VIRGIN 

(In  the  Five-Cornered  Tower  at  Nuremberg) 
A  Satire 

"Here,"  cried  the  Keeper's  daughter,  "here  she 
stands — 

The  Iron  Virgin  in  the  dungeon-gloom ; 
Mark  her  sweet,  placid  smile, — you  see,  no  hands 

Hath  she  to  tear  her  victims  to  their  doom, 
But  she  hath  handles," — here  she  opened  wide 

The  hellish  engine  on  its  hinges  old 
That  groaned  as  once  the  wretches  groaned  in 
side, — 

And  all  my  leaping  blood  stood  stricken  cold. 
"These  are  the  spikes  that  entered  at  the  eyes 

Where  entered  light  no  more, — this  one  with 

rust 
Corroded,  pierced  the  bursting  throat  whose  cries 

Soared  to  the  sobbing  angels,  let  us  trust. 
And  those  that  sank  into  the  breast  are  three; — 

(Observe  they  miss  the  heart) — these  four  the 

veins 
Transfixed,  and  lest  that  death  too  sudden  be, 

Slowly  they  closed  the  hollow  shell  with  chains. 

123 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


When  all  at  length  was  still  and  blood  unstopt 

From  the  remorseless  iron  ran  and  wept, 
Sheer  on  great,  mangling  knives  the  body  dropt 
And  shooting  streams  the  fragments  downward 

swept 
Low  to  the  river, — and  nor  man  nor  place 

Knew  more  of  them  who   knew  the  Maid's 
embrace." 

More  cruel  this  Virgin  than  the  Sirens  three 

Or    the    devouring    Sphinx    whose    lips    were 

stained 
With  lives  of  men, — and  yet  it  seems  to  me 

The  cruelest  of  the  cruel  have  remained. 
For  we  have  many  virgins,  nor  are  they, 

Nor  is  their  virtue  formed  of  iron  quite; 
They  smile  as  sweetly  and  they  smile  alway, 

And  they  have  hands — a  left  one  and  a  right. 
Yea,  hands  have  they — "how  happy  if  we  mote 

Into  the  arms  of  woman  straightway  fall 
Sans  need  to  fall  into  her  hands !" — so  wrote 

He  who  is  greatest,  wittiest  of  all 
The  living  wits.     The  Jungfrau's  red  caress 

Was  terrible — and  yet  she  granted  death, 
But  these  our  virgins  are  more  pitiless, — 

With  them  the  mangled  victim  keeps  his  breath. 
124 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


His  eyes  they  poniard  till  the  wretch  crawls  blind, 

Within  his  throat  his  fluttering  tongue  they 

nail, 
And  through  his  breast  a  hundred  irons  grind 

Their  way  from  fairest  hands  that  never  fail 
To  strike  the  heart.    They  break  it,  and  then  tear 

With  pearly  teeth  his  body  into  bands. 
(True,  what  a  blessing  to  poor  man  it  were 

Might  woman  be  divested  of  her  hands. ) 
No  river  hides  his  tortured  flesh,  but  he 

Is  scourged  into  the  world  all  bitter-bright, — 
There  ridicule  heaps  high  his  agony, 

And  leaves  him  naked  to  the  winds  and  night, 
To  die  a  thousand  times — a  thousand  times 

This  passion  and  this  cold  embrace  to  feel 
Of  these  automata,  these  iron  mimes, 

These  shells  malevolent  of  brass  or  steel, 
These  empty  figures  fair  that  know  no  sin 

And  are  all  smiles  without  and  cruelty  within. 


There  hung  this  crushing  humor  in  the  air, 
As  from  the  Five-Coign ed  Tower  swift  I  fled. 

Peace  bide  with  thee,  my  brother, — O  beware 
All  virgins — living,  moribund  or  dead! 

125 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  LAND  OF  ALABASTER 

The  sunset  burned  across  the  shackled  clouds, 
A  bar  of  tyrannous  and  angry  red; 

The  solar  king,  wrapped  gloomily  in  shrouds, 
Drew  sackcloth  o'er  his  old  and  humbled  head. 


Gaunt  stood  the  trees  o'er  meadows  paved  with 
snow; 

Their  shadows  crept  like  ghosts  begot  of  light 
And  perished  where  the  smouldering  winter  glow 

Made  way  for  dense  invasions  of  the  night. 


So  hewn  in  alabaster  lie  the  hills ; 

The  victor  flakes  upon  the  roofs  and  rocks 
Shine  wonderful.    Now  tinkling  music  fills 

This  land  of  snow  and  silence  as  the  flocks 


Creep  homeward  o'er  the  mute  marmoreal  palls 
Unbroken  and  immense  that  stretch  and  gleam ; 

The  blue  smoke  towers  o'er  the  roofs,  then  falls 
The  hand  of  Conqueror  Night  upon  the  dream. 

126 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  FORGING  OF  THE  RINGS 
An  Epithalamium 

Eros  am  I!     Created  things 

I  melt,  I  shape  with  flaming  wings. 

So  steel,  though  stubborned  stiff  with  fire, 

Trembles,  glows,  and  feels  desire; 

So  ice  upon  the  water's  breast 

Roars,  and  rends  its  armored  rest, 

And  bronzen  shapes  of  gods,  or  men 

Of  marble  flush  to  flesh  as  when 

Stones  from  out  Deukalion's  hands 

Sprang  to  young  and  lusty  bands, 

New  and  naked  in  the  light, 
Or  Music  reared  on  Theban  sands 

Tall  fanes  all  wondrous  white. 
Kinglier  might  than  kings  I  hold  ; 

Creation's  primal  cause 

Lies  graven  in  my  laws, 
And  this  green,  tiny  world  I  fold 

Close  with  wings  of  Day  and  Dark — 
I,  who  am  Nature's  Hierarch. 

Light  was  Chaos'  pristine  smile; 
I  was  Chaos'  pristine  song; 

127 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Her  globes  liquescent  quickened  while 

I  goaded  them  along. 
Oceans  are  but  slaves  to  moons; 

Moons  to  worlds  are  vassals  bound ; 

Worlds  must  follow  suns  around 
To  my  all-compellant  tunes 
Spun  from  undeciphered  runes. 

Flame!  myriads  of  millions 

Of  suns  beyond  the  scope  of  suns ! 

Mine  the  power  that  links  them,  mine 

Their  fire,  and  mine  the  splendor 
Of  giant  spheres  that  shine, 

Male  in  magnificence, 

On  swooning  moons  whose  tender 

Frail  glow  is  recompense 
For  light  their  virgin  fields  absorb 
From  each  enormous  master-orb. 
These  subject  to  my  will  I  hold, 
Controlling  who  am  uncontrolled 

Through  all  the  hours ; — 

Of  all  the  powers 
Remaining  youngest  of  the  young, 
Yet  oldest  of  the  old. 

The  myth  from  Hellas  sprung, 

128 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Decked  me  with  name  of  Eros — name 

That  holds  my  earthly  fame  alone 
But  not  my  cosmic  fame, 

Refulgent  to  a  farther  zone. 

My  fateful  anvil  throws 

Its  ruby  o'er  the  stars ; 
There  forge  I  joys  and  woes, 

And  love  that  makes  or  mars. 
Music  smitten  from  the  steel, 
Floats  in  many  a  waving  wheel, 

Which,  strong  and  clear, 

Gods  only  hear, 
And  mortals  only  feel. 
So  speeds  the  forging  of  the  rings : — 
Love,  singing,  swiftly  smites  the  gold,  and  smit 
ing,  sweetly  sings : 

Gold  in  beauty's  glamour  rolled! 
Light  of  loveliness,  unfold! 
Small,  smiling  sun,  yet  glorious,  re-risen, 

Delivered  unto  day  from  rock-ribbed  gloom, 
Over  what  vales  victorious?  what  prison, 

Gold   of  the  gentle   glow, — what  mountain's 
womb 

129 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Of  clustered  spars, 
Or  crystal  bars 

Coffined  thy  rays  in  clasping  ore? 
Till  some  sharp  bolt,  in  thunder  sent, 
The  startled  crypts  in  sunder  rent 
And  double  day  within  thy  cavern  bore? 
Fair  fruit  of  Earth,  for  human  fate, 
Bright  emblems   of  eternity 
Shall  be  fashioned  out  of  thee. 
Nor  curse  of  coin,  nor  csesar's  crowns,  nor  tires 
of  state. 


Let  percussive  hammers  mould 

Thee  to  circlets  twain,  O  gold. 

Impassioned,  yielding  metal,  far  too  mellow, 

In  thee  a  strain  of  iron  must  be  bound, 
A  silvern  flux  must  settle  as  its  fellow, 

And  strength  with  purity  as  one  compound. 
So  twain  and  twin, 
The  rings  begin 
To  scatter  light  upon  the  wind, 
And  murmur  forth  a  golden  note 
That  wizards  sere  and  olden  mote 
Have  woven  from  the  mystic  airs  of  Ind 
To  lash  a  seraph's  heart  aflame 

130 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Once,  once  to  taste  an  earthly  kiss! 
With  promised  pregnancies  of  bliss 
The  heavenly  hoops  lie  done  and  seize  a  fairer 
name. 

Gleaming  rings  of  Wedlock,  great 
With  love,  with  mystery,  with  fate! 
In  you  what  hope  from  mortal  vision  hidden, 

Hints  of  long  generations  yet  to  grow 
From  two  who  at  Love's  portal  stand  unbidden, 
Led  by  the  fairest  dream  the  heart  can  know? 
And  though  malign 
Or  blest  the  sign 

That  burns  in  prophet-flame  above, 
With  bliss  or  woe  for  distant  days, 
Think  but  of  the  insistent  lays 
From  hearts  athrob  with  pulsing  harps  of  Love. 
From  tabernacled  lamps  a  ray 
Falls  far  where  unborn  spirits  shine 
Beyond  the  years — an  endless  line, 
Beyond  the  all-crowning  kiss — beyond  the  nup 
tial  day. 

Servant  cirques  that  Life  ordains 

For  links  in  its  successive  chains, 

131 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Binding  with  bands  eternal,  man  and  woman,    , 

So  that  two  destinies  know  but  one  path, 
And  all  that  is  supernal  or  is  human, 

On  Earth  a  two-fold  day  and  duty  hath, — 
Ye  aureate  rounds 
Ye  span  the  bounds 

'Twixt  soul  and  clay,  'twixt  hearts  and  hands, 
And  purify  with  finer  flame, 
And  bless  with  a  diviner  name 
The    impulse    and   the    law    that    naught    with 
stands  ; — 

Ye  lay  on  Passion  spells  of  Peace, 
And  are  its  riches  and  reward 
Which  swords  of  seraphim  must  guard 
From  hungry  Time's  annulling  rage  that  bans  the 
world's  increase. 

Hark !  the  melody  that  clinks 
Pure  from  those  portentous  links! 
It  darts  within  the  elements  rejoicing, 

It  trembles  in  the  throats  of  thrilling  bells, 
Whose  tongues,   soon  stirred  to  eloquence,   are 

voicing 

O'er  flights  of  clouds,  the  happiness  that  wells, 
And  rolling  mounts 
From  raptured  founts 
132 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


Of  wine  within  each  leaping  heart 

Whose  floods  with  dyes  of  gladness  glow 
Till  they  a  noble  madness  know, 
While  Fancy  snares  the  brain  with  siren  art. 
Burn,  happy,  happy  day  thy  light 
In  azure  o'er  this  hallowed  pair! 
For  two  so  young,  for  two  so  fair, 
O  lend  thy  smile  to  Even,   O  lend  thy  joy  to 
Night. 


But  another  note  ye  own, 
Rings,  of  harsh,  repellant  tone, 
Like  iron  struck  to  clamorous  outcrying; 

Then  both  your  burnished  bands  grow  tyrant 

chains, 

Your  soft'ning  song,  your  amorous  deep  sighing 
Are  dumb  with  rusten  dolors  and  sore  pains. 
For  cursed  they 
Who  burn  away 

With  lust  or  strife  your  mild  alloy, — 
Reverting  unto  mordant  gyves, 
You  gnaw  their  waste  discordant  lives 
And  canker  all  the  yearning  rose  of  Joy. 
You  fetter  heart,  you  fetter  soul, 

133 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


You  fling  a  venom  on  the  air, 
And  Misery,  mute  in  marble  there, 
Hath  Age  for  its  ally  and  Ruin  for  its  goal! 


O  ye  whose  warm,  responsive  hands 
Lock  with  those  from  shadow-lands 
Beyond  Night's  moors  or  meadows  of  the  morn 
ing, 

'Twixt  dead  and  unborn  races  intervene 
On  litten  heights  your  shadows,  Life  adorning 
Where  noon-tide  parts  the  seeing  and  unseen. 
A  race  shall  rise 
'Neath  future  skies 

From  flames  that  bloom  within  your  breasts ; 
For  you  who  pause  on  Aidenn's  hills 
A  moment  ere  this  cadence  stills, 
And   Earth   once  more  grows   gray   before   her 

guests, 
Are  stones  of  Atlantean  piles 

Advancing  tribes  rear  over  Death, 
Bequeathing  mind  and  blood  and  breath, 
Where  fast  o'er  Time's  destroying  sea,  Love  lifts 
his  shining  isles. 


134 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


THE  STORM-NIGHT 

All  the  moonless  night  the  strong 
Hissing  levins  lanced  the  steeps, 

And  the  throats  of  thunder  long 
Bellowed  o'er  the  smoking  deeps 

Whence  the  shaggy  crags  were  rent 

As  the  storm  their  forests  bent, 
Like  the  crowns  of  kings  in  woe. 

Black  I  saw  the  charging  cloud 
Fraught  with  fire  against  the  peak, 

Saw  it  wrecked  with  tumult  loud, 
Loosing  all  its  bolts  to  wreak 

Vengeance  on  the  gulfs  inane, 

But  its  flashing  brands  in  vain 

Plunged  and  blazed  within  the  pit. 

Overhead  with  hollow  roar, 

Rolled  the  mangled  wastes  of  night, 
Filled  with  voices  rude  that  tore 

Down  the  firmamental  height 
To  the  Earth  a  sullen  path 
For  the  waters  launched  in  wrath 

And  the  winds.    All  winds  were  there ! 


LOOMS   OF  LIFE 


Yea,  the  winds  on  giant  reeds 

Blew,  and  called  the  cliffs  to  come 

With  the  whirlwinds  on  their  steeds 
To  this  Pandemonium. 

How  their  hulks  heaved  in  the  dark! 

Like  the  Flood  beneath  the  Ark, 
To  an  organ-octave  vast. 

Bowed  my  heart  unto  their  thrill, 
And  my  lips  were  loosed  to  shout, 

I  grew  brother  to  the  hill 

And  the  storm-shape's  whirling  rout. 

So,  on  tides  of  thunder  tost, 

I,  immersed  in  strife  and  lost, 
Joyed  the  elemental  war! 

Then  mine  arms  invoked  profounds 
Where  swart  demons  of  the  dark 

Shaped  me  gods  from  sights  and  sounds, 
Till  great  Peace,  the  Hierarch, 

From  his  throne  called  unto  Dis 

Brooding  o'er  the  mad  abyss, 
And  my  pagan  soul  grew  still. 

Sank  the  winds.     Each  phalanx  grim 
Of  the  battling  clouds  withdrew, 

136 


LOOMS  OF  LIFE 


And  the  cloven  peaks  that  dim 

Fret  the  shores  of  pendant  blue, 
Through  the  smiling  world  upsoared 
While  the  lingering  stars  adored 
Morn  in  majesty  revealed. 

Soon  the  new-born  ray  of  Dawn 
Burnt  upon  the  Orient  range, 

And  my  yearning  soul  was  drawn 
To  my  brethren,  mute  and  strange. 

Through  the  pure  and  vibrant  air 

Mountant  sprang  the  solar  flare 
As  the  birds  and  blooms  awoke. 

Then  to  lower  vales  of  light 

And  the  homes  and  hearts  of  men, 

Burnt  my  footsteps  swift  and  bright 
Down  the  mountain  and  the  glen. 

So  I  left  the  heights  above, 

Longing  for  the  warmer  love 
Lying  on  a  woman's  lips. 


•<        ^07THE    J 

(UNIVERSITY) 

OF 
^-CX\'  iprjt 


137 


'.i,  n  '  ^ 


YB   I  183 


182273 


in 


. 


